He hesitated. “I was a magistrate,” he said.
Again he paused, and when he spoke at last, his voice was heavy with barely controlled anger and grief. “A sudden change in the political situation forced me to flee for my life. I sent my wife and children back to her parents for safety and joined the bandits to seek revenge.”
A magistrate! Lalu twisted round to face him. “Does Chen know?”
“Of course.”
“Isn’t he afraid of what you might do when you go back to being a magistrate?”
Ding laughed mirthlessly. “Water once spilled cannot be gathered again.”
“But what about after you’ve had your revenge?” Lalu persisted.
“You think I’m different from the other bandits,” Ding said harshly. “I’m not. Chen. Zhuo. Zhu. We’re all the same. Outlaws. And none of us will ever be anything else.”
His voice softened. “Lalu, I know your mother and father did not raise you to be sold to a house of leisure, just as my parents did not raise me to be a bandit, but we have no choice except to follow the paths Heaven has allotted us.”
Lalu, facing forward again, said nothing. But as they climbed up the steep trail to the ridge where Chen and the others waited, she vowed she would never accept the path Ding claimed Heaven had assigned her.
She waited until darkness fell on the sleeping camp. Then, hoping the bandits’ snores and the horses’ restless stomping and whinnying would smother the crunch of broken rocks beneath her feet, Lalu edged past the two scouts keeping watch. Slowly and carefully, she worked her way back to the crest of the narrow valley the horses had climbed with such difficulty only a few hours before. By the time she reached it, the moon had risen, coating the dry, dusty grasses and bushes with a pearl white sheen. She closed her eyes briefly, murmured a prayer to Guanyin, the Merciful One, and began her descent.
The trail was steeper, more treacherous than she remembered. Half walking, half crawling, she clutched the jewelry hidden in her waistband with one hand and reached out the other to steady herself. Thorns ripped her palm. Stifling a cry, she jerked back, slipped, and fell.
Sharp bits of gravel pierced Lalu’s thin cotton pants. Dust and dirt filled her mouth, nostrils, and eyes, making her choke as she hurtled down the sheer slope. She grabbed blindly at a bush, catching twigs which snapped beneath her weight. Skin tore off the sides of her hands, her legs. She felt an ankle lodge in a rut and dug in, reaching wildly for a nearby boulder. The effort pulled her arms half out of their sockets, flinging her sideways, knocking her head against a huge rock face, wedging her right shoulder and hip in a crevice.
The blow stunned Lalu. She lay still, her breathing ragged and shallow. Gradually, the darkness receded and the pain of torn muscles and bruised flesh sharpened. There was the sound of muffled voices.
High above her, spread out around the rim of the valley, pitch pine torches flickered like fallen stars, signaling a search. She leaned back. Solid rock gave way to black emptiness, and she fell again, landing in soft, stinking mire.
She had fallen into a cave, she realized. Was it a lair? Stories she had heard of children carried off by tigers pulled her upright. Hands stretched out before her, she staggered toward the moonlit crack through which she had fallen. Fingers touched wall. Wincing, Lalu leaned her weight against her stinging palms, using the wall for guidance and support as she blundered toward the sliver of light.
Small, soft bodies wriggled beneath her hand, and she heard a curious gnashing like the grinding of hundreds of tiny teeth. Clamping her jaws together to keep from screaming, Lalu crouched low. Her body crawled with gooseflesh and she gagged as the nauseating odor of dung mingled with the stink of fear. Ghostly wings brushed her face and neck. Spirits? Then what were the creatures clustered on the walls?
Through the fissure, moonlight beckoned, promising release from this hideous trap. Lalu dragged herself toward it. Chills racked her sweat-soaked, fiery body, impeding her progress. Then, all at once, the crack of light vanished in a rush of flapping wings, and she found herself trapped in total darkness. Sobbing uncontrollably, she sank defeated onto the muck-covered cave floor.
Just as suddenly as the splinter of light had vanished, it reappeared, with a bat silhouetted against the pale white beam. A bat, symbol of good luck. A sign from the gods? Again wings whirred past Lalu, blocking the opening. Bats. She was in a bat cave!
Relief swept over Lalu in a wash of giggles. She pictured her brothers’ faces as she told them the story. How they would laugh! Except, of course, they would never hear her tell the story. “You must be quiet or I won’t come back,” she had told them. Did they think she had disappeared because of them? Or had her father told them that he had sold her for seed?
“The bitch has got to be around here somewhere.”
Lalu flinched as though she had been slapped. How could the bandits have come so close so quickly? Her eyes riveted on the only opening through which they could come, she backed crablike into the farthest recesses of the cave. Her limbs, cut, bruised, scratched, and sore from the long hours on horseback and her recent tumble, screamed protest, but she dared not stop. Trembling, slipping, straining, she fell onto her knees and crawled until she hit solid rock. There, huddled against the unresisting boulders, she hugged her soiled knees to her chest and whispered, “The bandits can search for days and never find me here.”
Like a Buddhist nun repeating her beads, she said the same sentence over and over. At last, mesmerized by her own whisperings, her tightly clasped arms relaxed their hold, and she collapsed into exhausted slumber.
A piercing, high-pitched squeaking and the furious flapping of wings wakened Lalu. She rubbed her eyes. While she had slept, the sliver of moonlight in the cave opening had turned into a golden beam. And then she realized the golden beam was not sunlight, but a pitch pine torch.
Unable to move, she stared as the flames moved closer until the light shone above her, blinding, and she heard Ding say, “Don’t you understand, you cannot escape your fate?”
NINE
The rickshaw puller stopped abruptly, throwing Chen and Lalu forward. “House of Heavenly Pleasure,” he called.
Lalu climbed out onto the hot, dusty street in front of a massive wall the height of two men. She gazed up at the broken glass embedded into the wall’s rim. Was it there to keep out thieves or to prevent escapes?
“Come on, come on, stop gawking like a country bumpkin,” Chen said, herding Lalu toward the gatekeeper’s house.
The gatekeeper’s stare made Lalu as uncomfortable as the garish purple jacket, apricot pants, and thick layers of makeup which Chen had insisted she wear.
“A new pullet ready for plucking,” Chen said.
The gatekeeper grinned. He opened a small side door. “The Madam will be pleased with this one.”
The sight of wide green lawns dotted with rock gardens, lotus ponds surrounded by graceful weeping willows, and a spectacular main house with carved wooden railings, vermillion columns, and green-glazed roof gave Lalu no pleasure. She knew Ding was pleased that he had persuaded Chen to bring her here, for he had told her in one last conspiritorial whisper, “I know from my days as a magistrate that this house serves only rich, famous, refined gentlemen. Do as you are told, try to please, and you are bound to be bought out soon and installed as a concubine or perhaps even a secondary wife in some wealthy household.” But she had her own plan, one that depended on her sale price being kept as low as possible.
Doubling over as though from pain, Lalu felt under her jacket, seeking reassurance from the bulge of jewelry hidden in her waistband. Against the magnificence of the House of Heavenly Pleasure, it seemed abysmally insufficient to carry out her scheme.
“Hurry up,” Chen said.
Lalu’s hands dropped from waist to feet. “These shoes are too small.”
Chen grabbed Lalu’s collar and twisted.
“You’re creasing my jacket,” Lalu said.
He glared down at her.
“Don’t rub the scales under a dragon’s neck,” he warned, pushing her past the spirit gate. “One false move and you’ll wish you had never been born.”
An arrogant housemaid ushered them past growling guard dogs into a cool, shadowy anteroom. The wood paneled walls, latticed ceiling, painted glass lanterns, and thickly carpeted floor confirmed Lalu’s worst fears. Drained of hope, she allowed Chen to propel her behind a heavily carved blackwood chair.
“Now remember,” Chen instructed. “When you smile, don’t expose your teeth. If the Madam asks you to walk, take small, mincing steps so she won’t notice your big feet. If she offers us food, don’t wolf it down, take delicate little nibbles.”
A middle-aged woman, tall and elegantly dressed, emerged from behind a double panel of embroidered silk. “Is the girl such an ignorant peasant that she needs last minute coaching?” she asked.
“No, no, of course not,” Chen said, pivoting to face her and bow.
The Madam turned to Lalu. “Come out from behind the chair so I can see you.”
Encouraged by the woman’s warm smile, Lalu walked out boldly.
“Small steps,” Chen hissed.
“Your feet are not bound,” the Madam said. “Why?”
“I was . . .”
Chen interrupted. “I assure you, they have been bound and can easily be bound again.” Under the Madam’s icy stare, his voice trailed off weakly.
“I asked the girl.”
“I was needed in the fields,” Lalu explained.
The Madam walked over to the round lacquer table between the two blackwood chairs. She dipped a square of cloth in a bowl of scented water. Her long tapered fingers wrung out the cloth, and she wiped Lalu’s face free of rouge, dye, and rice powder while Chen hovered nervously.
“The girl looks half starved.”
“We’re from the North where we’ve been suffering famine from a bad drought,” Chen said quickly. “To be very honest, the girl’s parents, my brother and his wife, died from hunger. Since the wife and I took her in, we’ve given her what we can afford, but we’re poor ourselves, which is why we’re forced to sell the girl much as it grieves us.”
“Spare me your fairy tales,” the Madam said.
She sat down. As Chen bowed and backed onto the edge of the opposite chair, the Madam reached for the silver waterpipe on the table between them. She opened the lid of the tobacco box. Using little silver tweezers, she picked up a pinch of tobacco which she poked into the pipe. She lit the pipe, drew two leisurely puffs, emptied out the smoked tobacco, and repeated the process.
Watching her, Lalu felt a small surge of hope. She had seen her father act in this same unconcerned manner when he wanted to beat down the price of what he was buying. Pretending to smooth out her jacket, she patted the little cache. If the Madam proved a shrewd bargainer, her jewelry might be enough to buy her freedom after all.
Chen squirmed. His mouth opened and closed like a fish caught in a net gasping for air. He mopped his face with the backs of his hands, his sleeves. Finally, he burst out, “The girl may be thin, but it makes her look delicate. Like expensive porcelain.”
“Our patrons are more interested in flesh and blood,” the Madam said dryly.
“Oh, you’ll find plenty of both. And in the right places too.”
“So, she isn’t a virgin.”
“Oh no, I didn’t mean to imply . . . oh, how could you think?” Chen stammered, horrified. “Of course she’s a virgin. My sister-in-law was a pious woman, and the girl has been strictly brought up.”
“You all say that, but where will I find you to get my money back if she is not?”
“I’ll give you my address in the city.”
“You just said you were from the North.”
“Look, if you don’t want the girl, just say so. There are plenty of Madams that will,” Chen snapped.
The Madam set her pipe down. “Perhaps, but none of them can afford to pay the price I can. Isn’t that why you’re here?”
“I’m asking eighty thousand cash.”
Aghast, Lalu cried, “You gave my father two bags of seed worth no more than a small string of cash!”
Chen leaped out of his chair and slapped Lalu.
“You’re damaging your merchandise,” the Madam said calmly. “And the price you’re asking is absurd. Even a goddess wouldn’t bring you that much.”
Chen drew himself up. He tapped his puffed out chest with his index finger. “I know what you charge for one night with a virgin.”
The Madam’s brow wrinkled in barely concealed disgust.
“This is not the kind of house you frequent. Virgin or not, we cannot offer our guests an untutored peasant obtainable for free from their own servants’ quarters. Before your ‘niece’ can serve as a daughter of joy, she will need time and money poured into her for lessons in singing, dancing, and all the other techniques of her new profession.” She paused. “I can offer you fifteen thousand cash.”
Chen stormed toward the door. “Come on. Let’s go.”
Lalu thought swiftly. If she went with Chen, he would probably take her to a Madam as filthy and coarse as the landlady at the inn where they had spent the previous night. The price of sale would be lower, one that her bits and pieces of jewelry would surely cover, but would she be able to trust the woman not to steal them from her?
She studied the impassive face of the Madam who sat before her. Her eyes glittered as sharply as the points of finely honed needles, yet her touch had been gentle, and she had spoken kindly. She might be hard, but she would be fair.
Chen shook Lalu. “Come on.”
She hesitated.
His fingers dug into her shoulders. “Move.”
“No, I won’t.”
“You’re mine, you’ll do as I say.”
As though Chen and Lalu had not spoken, the Madam said, “Twenty thousand.”
“Seventy thousand,” Chen countered.
“Twenty-five thousand.”
“Sixty thousand.”
“As you said yourself, there is a famine in the North. Soon girls like this one will be sold for three or four thousand cash, perhaps even a single bag of seed,” the Madam said.
“Fifty thousand.”
“Thirty thousand. That’s my last offer.”
Chen released Lalu. “All right, but I might as well be giving her away.”
The Madam reached into the strongbox beside her and counted out the strings of cash. Still grumbling, Chen snatched them and left.
As soon as the door closed behind him, Lalu unpinned the gold and silver earrings, jade bangle, and jade button from beneath her jacket. Within the rich grandeur of the anteroom, the earrings seemed tarnished and dull, the jade less green. She rubbed them against her new clothes and held them up to the Madam. “I want to buy myself.”
The Madam rose. “Sit down,” she said, guiding Lalu into the blackwood chair across from her.
Lalu thrust the jewelry up at the Madam. “If it’s not enough, I’ll work off the balance.”
The Madam closed Lalu’s fingers around the jade and silver and gold, gently forcing the fists onto Lalu’s lap. “Keep your jewelry, it might be useful to you someday.”
“If it can’t buy my freedom, what use can it have?” Lalu demanded.
A twinge of pain flashed across the Madam’s face. “The man who sold you called you Lalu. Is that your name?”
Lalu nodded sullenly.
“But he is not your uncle.”
Lalu shook her head.
“How did this man who is not your uncle come to sell you?” the Madam asked.
Lalu uncurled her fingers. She stared at the jewelry she had believed would save her, the specks of blood where the sharp points of the earrings had pierced her palms. If the glittering baubles could not buy her freedom, perhaps her story would. Choosing her words carefully, she told how Chen had forced her from her father, her attempt to escape, her capture, and the beating she had received.
I
n the silence that followed, she heard someone in another part of the house plucking the strings of a lute. The slow, wailing melody fell like a rain of teardrops. Would another girl brought for sale at some future date hear her play or would the Madam let her go?
“Do you know what a cormorant is?” the Madam asked.
“It’s a bird that eats fish,” Lalu said, puzzled.
“Have you seen how fishermen use them to catch fish?”
“They put rings around the birds’ necks so the birds can catch the fish but not swallow them. But what . . .”
The Madam interrupted. “Like the cormorant, I have a person I work for. You saw me pay for you, but you are not mine to do with as I choose.”
Lalu fought back tears. Had she, like her father, gambled and lost? “I don’t understand.”
The Madam pointed her ringed fingers at the rich silk hangings, bowls of semiprecious fruits, antique vases, and carved jade and ivory bric-a-brac that filled the room. “All this is a result of my labor, yet it is not mine any more than the fish a cormorant catches is his. I work for a high government official who offers me the protection I need to live. But you are fortunate Chen brought you here today.”
Lalu leaped out of her chair. “You mean you will let me buy myself back?”
“Lalu, you have great strength. Don’t waste it on fighting for the impossible,” the Madam said. She pointed to a scroll on the wall. “Look at that bamboo. It’s strong, but it bends in the wind, just as you must learn to do.”
“Then why did you say I was lucky Chen brought me here today?” Lalu cried.
“Normally, I would not be able to buy a scrawny, dark-skinned girl with feet like dragon boats, but today I have a special buyer who does not care about such things, someone who will take you to America.”
TEN
Like the hold of the ship, the San Francisco customs shed was dimly lit, but at least the lanterns did not pitch and sway; and the air, though stale and stinking from the press of unwashed bodies, did not reek of vomit or human waste. If anything, the din from hundreds of voices, mostly male, had grown louder. But there was life and excitement in the shouting, joyful expectation in the rush for luggage, relatives, and friends.
Thousand Pieces of Gold Page 5