My Splendid Concubine

by Lofthouse, Lloyd

  “The fact that your first emperor slept with six girls does not fix my problems with Ayaou and Shao-mei,” Robert said. “Talking about what my people would think of me is not going to do it either.”

  “Master,” Guan-jiah said, “the problem has nothing to do with your girls. It has to do with the extreme beliefs in the afterlife by Christians. We Chinese, on the other hand, worship common sense and dislike all unproven theories and all conduct that exceeds accepted moral behavior.”

  Robert’s mouth dropped open. He hadn’t expected this opinion from his servant. He forced his mouth to close and erased the shock from his face. “Guan-jiah,” he said, “where do you find all the time to dwell on things like this?”

  His servant started walking across the consulate kitchen. “Would you like a cup of tea, Master? It is best to discuss common sense over a cup of tea.” He went to the consulate stove, picked up the teapot, and poured two cups of tea. He carried them to the table. He set one lukewarm cup in front of Robert.

  “Emperor T’ang—over a thousand years ago—said he always listened to two contradictory extremes of counsel over the same issue before deciding,” Guan-jiah said, “and he usually took about half the advice from each side to find a middle ground. Since you have already listened to the banker, you should consider me the other extreme. That is why we Chinese call our country the Middle Kingdom. Like Emperor T’ang, we seek the middle ground to keep a balance.” He took a sip and made a face. “No disrespect, Master, but Mrs. Winchester cannot brew tea.” He put the cup down as if it had been poisoned.

  Robert sipped and discovered Guan-jiah was right. This tea was bitterly strong. Mrs. Winchester must have used twice as many tealeaves and brewed it too long.

  “If you are seeking advice, Master, I counsel that you find the middle ground, which means you cannot lean too far toward your Christian morals, and you cannot act like Emperor Ch’ing-shi-huang-ti and sleep with your concubines at the same time.”

  “How do I do that? How do I balance Confucianism with Christianity?”

  “Think of it this way, Master. Christians live to be accepted into their heaven after death. Everything they do is aimed toward that goal. However, Confucianism is a religion of common sense based on our earthly senses and desires. If you consider man’s nature, no man should marry but most men do, so Confucianism advises marriage. It would be nice if all men were equal, but they are not. There are emperors, princes, and generals, and there are workers, followers, and warriors. It is because of this that Confucianism teaches authority and obedience. It is the foundation for piety. It is why the father has so much authority. Men and women should not be different, but they are. Confucianism teaches that the sexes are different, and we live in a man’s world.”

  “My religion believes that women are equal to men,” Robert said.

  “Does that mean you can bear children, Master?”

  “You should have been a teacher, Guan-jiah, instead of a servant. How does this solve my problems? You’re talking about common sense, and I am dealing with two girls fighting over me. Jealousy does not react to common sense.”

  “Ah yes, sex.” Guan-jiah’s eyes glowed with an energy Robert hadn’t seen before. The servant went to the stove, poured out the tea and started a new pot. “We cannot drink this, Master. I will brew a fresh pot. I have some chrysanthemum tea more suited to conversation.”

  Once they had two fresh cups of tea, the conversation continued, but Guan-jiah did the talking. “Buddhism and, from what I’ve learned, Christianity,” he said, “say sex leads to sin. Confucius, on the other hand, says sex is a perfectly normal function, because it is connected with the continuation of the family and the human species.”

  Robert lifted the lid on his cup and steam billowed out. It smelled marvelous. It was aromatic, sweet, and spicy at the same time. He saw nutmeg seeds floating with the chrysanthemum flowers and shavings from vanilla beans. There were other things he couldn’t identify. Maybe that was why Guan-jiah felt this tea was more suitable to a conversation.

  “Your solution, Master, is to get both of your concubines pregnant. When Ayaou is also pregnant, she will have no reason to be jealous of Shao-mei. As the adopted uncle, I am willing to go to the herbalist and purchase herbs you will put in Shao-mei’s tea and soup, so the baby will be born a girl. Girls are worthless, so this will solve that problem. Then I will go to the herbalist to buy what will help Ayaou get pregnant and have a boy child.”

  At home, Robert caught himself enjoying the look of concentration on Shao-mei’s face as she wrote a new Chinese poem. When she wrote every symbol correct, he rewarded her with ticklish kisses on her neck behind an ear. The sound of her laughter brought joy to his soul. He also loved to watch Ayaou wash her hair and comb it for what felt like hours. When that was happening, he’d catch a look in Shao-mei’s eyes. He knew that she was studying him to see what pleased him.

  Sure enough, the next day he’d find her doing the same as Ayaou had done—washing her hair and taking forever to comb it out while casting sly glances at him. He made an effort not to disappoint her and watched.

  One night Ayaou stopped in the middle of their lovemaking. “Before we finish satisfying your sun instrument, I want you to make a promise.”

  “What is it?” he said.

  “I want you to promise to sleep with Shao-mei once a week. I want to punish her for being too possessive of you.”

  “What!” he said. This was absurd. It was beyond absurd. “How can you ask me this? I want this to be a house of happiness. That cannot happen if I make such a promise. Shao-mei will be unhappy. I’m not going to stop my current practice of sleeping with you one night and Shao-mei the next.” He didn’t tell her that when he was with Shao-mei nothing happened beyond cuddling. Robert still hadn’t had intercourse with Shao-mei. He was determined not to until the child was born.

  “Robert, what other choice have you? If you do not punish Shao-mei, she is going to become more possessive. I see how she looks at you. You are blind.”

  “This house is like a bucket of milk turning sour. If this is the price to have intercourse with you, we will not make love again.” He rolled away from her and pretended to go to sleep.

  Ayaou had been knocked into a shocked silence, and the atmosphere in the room turned frigid. Robert had never turned away from her before—not like this. A moment passed. Then she said, “I am sorry, Robert. Please do not punish me like this. I will not be able to sleep unless your hands come to touch me, and your sun instrument shines with pleasure. I will not make this kind of demand again.”

  Robert suppressed his bitter and victorious smile. He rolled over and reached for her. He had taken Guan-jiah’s advice and was spiking their tea and soup with herbs designed to ensure Shao-mei of a girl child and to get Ayaou pregnant with a male child. He hoped it worked.

  “I can’t wait for your advice to work, Guan-jiah. After Ayaou gets pregnant, we have to wait nine months until she delivers. I’m desperate. There is no way to know how long it will take before she conceives.”

  “Master,” he said, “if you are in a hurry to create harmony in your house, may I suggest that you set up rules as Chinese masters do?”

  “And what would those be?” Robert asked, wary of the answer.

  “I will write them and give them to you later in the day,” he said. “Now is not the time to talk.” He cast a glance toward the door that led to the next room where Mrs. Winchester was. “You are getting behind in your paperwork. I know how much that bothers you.” Guan-jiah left.

  That evening, after Robert finished work, Guan-jiah handed him a leather whip and the sheet of suggested rules. Most of the rules made sense like the one about who spoke the first harsh words that started a fight received the punishment. The punishment was to use the whip and tear the flesh off their lovely backs until they become a mass of scars and scabs. Robert couldn’t bear the thought of beating them.

  “Why the whip?” he asked. “I can’t use th
at.”

  “There’s no other way to make a horse behave, Master. My father has a whip. All the married men I know have whips or sticks to beat their women, but they seldom use them. All it usually takes is once. If that does not work, you can always hang one with a silk rope. That is what the Emperor does in the Forbidden City to a concubine that does not behave. I heard that one concubine had her arms and legs removed. She was the most beautiful woman in China. It was because of her beauty that she thought it gave her power over the Emperor. They say he cried when she was punished. Her torso was put into a large vase, so her head protruded from the top. The other concubines are made to walk through that room where the limbless concubine is kept alive in that vase as an example.

  “Master, if you do not use the whip when you ride your concubines, it will be like riding a horse that goes where it wants instead of where you want it to go. After all, a woman’s role is to be ridden, but the outcome is better than just being transported from one place to another.”

  “Outcome?” Robert replied, shocked at Guan-jiah’s explicit images.

  His servant looked at him oddly. “Master, the outcome is sons, many sons to carry on the family name. A horse cannot give you that—your concubines or wives can. And if you have girl children, you can arrange marriages with families who will improve your life.” He smiled proudly. “Why do you think I suggested the herbs?”

  Robert was confused. He wasn’t sure when Guan-jiah was talking about women and when he was talking about horses. They seemed to be the same thing to his servant.

  When Robert arrived home that evening, he hid the sheet of rules and the whip under the bed he shared with Ayaou. No one cleaned under the beds. The whip and list of rules sunk into a thick layer of dust.

  That night he slept with Ayaou. While they were making love, he thought of that whip under the bed and imagined using it on her while he rode her. He saw himself strapping a saddle to her lovely back and making her carry him to work.

  When they finished making love, Robert said, “I’m not taking sides between you and Shao-mei. I want to make that clear, Ayaou. I’m not going to allow jealousy to destroy what we have.”

  Instead of cuddling and throwing her legs on top of his—which was her habit after they had intercourse—she snorted with a derisive sound and rolled over with her back toward him.

  Her desirable back, the one he loved looking at, was suddenly not so lovely. Maybe Guan-jiah was right, and a few well-placed scars would solve this problem. He imagined her back with scabs and red scars crisscrossing it. It wouldn’t look so desirable and lovely anymore once it was blemished. She might be like a horse to a Chinese man, but she wasn’t to Robert. He decided to leave the whip where it was. There was enough anger in the house already.

  The next night when he went to Shao-mei’s room, she made the same demand Ayaou made. She said that Robert should punish Ayaou by sleeping with her once a week.

  He wanted to know who was feeding such ideas to his girls, so he asked.

  Shao-mei replied, “You paid for me first, Robert. That makes me the number one concubine. Ayaou should be punished. When she stops arguing, I will stop. After all, I am only defending myself.”

  “I didn’t ask for that. I wanted to know who you are talking to.”

  “I haven’t talked to anyone. What I am saying is common sense.”

  To make things worse, despite his warnings that having intercourse might damage the baby or risk her having a miscarriage, she started seducing him. She was loud about it too. She turned so the length of her naked back was exposed to him and moved toward him. When her buttocks rubbed against his crotch, Robert’s member stood at attention like the little mercenary it was. He was afraid he wasn’t strong enough to resist.

  When Robert managed not to engage in intercourse, she turned and brushed her lips across the tip of his erection. Fighting his desire to take her, Robert sat and pushed her head from his member. “Stop, Shao-mei.”

  She refused to listen. Instead, she went down and wrapped her lips around its tip. She tickled his member with her tongue. Robert felt his resolve and his sense of reason vanishing. The little wild beast stiffened into a solid root. “Shao-mei, please. We have a problem to solve.” She sucked harder. He found it impossible to think.

  She came up for air, and said, “You do not need anybody else. See, though I am heavy with a child, I can still make you happy. You want me. Your sun instrument tells me so.” She went down and took it into her mouth again.

  “Shao-mei, no.” He struggled to stay in control, but he knew he wouldn’t last much longer. “Shao-mei, we must talk.”

  “Talk as much as you want,” she said. “Nobody is stopping you.” She continued sucking.

  Robert was overwhelmed with desire, but he resisted. “I am not a carrot,” he said. With a mighty effort of will, he managed to push her away. He put on the robe and tossed a blanket over her. With all the dignity he could muster, he said, “I must tell you, Shao-mei, I don’t like what you’re doing. I’ll deal with you later!” His voice didn’t sound convincing. “It’s wrong of you to risk your health and the health of the baby like this. It just is.”

  His erection was protruding from the robe. She laughed then stood and let her blanket slip to the floor. Turning, she threw one naked hip out at an angle. She stood on tiptoe and stuck her buttocks toward him. She arched her back and looked over her shoulder. She licked her tongue along her lips in an invitation that was too bold to mistake. “Look what you are walking away from,” she said. “Do you want to do that?”

  Robert retreated to the larger bedroom. He found Ayaou quietly sobbing. He climbed into bed next to her and pulled her toward him. “Let’s talk, Ayaou.”

  Her hands went all over him. She saw his erection and anger flared in her eyes. “Fine,” she said, “but I must talk my way.” She pressed her mouth on his. He tried to push her away, but she was like a leech. “Fight me off if that is what you want,” she said, “but I will not stop until I bring you to the pleasure cliff and make you jump.”

  She pulled over his left hand to touch the wetness between her thighs. His mind tipped off balance and lust took over. He thrust his member into her with such force their bellies slapped against each other.

  Ayaou groaned and twisted her body beneath his. Robert couldn’t do anything but dance to her rhythm. When he closed his eyes, he saw Shao-mei as if she were the one he was having intercourse with—not Ayaou. It was exhilarating. Guan-jiah was right about one thing. A woman was like a good horse, because, when a man had the right mount, he never wanted to get off.

  Robert awoke to the sound of screams from downstairs. He threw on a robe and ran. The study to the left of the stairs was empty. He saw the first victim on the floor in there.

  “No,” he said, and stumbled into the room. The first victim had been a gift, a silk bag for his ink-stone. Shao-mei had made it. Ayaou must have cut it up with a pair of scissors. He’d loved that bag. Shao-mei had embroidered a pair of lovebirds on it. She’d said that the larger bird was Robert. She was the other one. They were going to build a nest together and fill it with little baby birds. Robert went down on his knees and gathered the scraps.

  “You will pay for it.” Shao-mei yelled from the kitchen. “Ayaou, I swear that I will not let you get away with this.”

  “I have warned you several times,” Ayaou replied. The tone of her voice was unkind. “This is the last warning, before I tell Robert to sell you.”

  He froze with the scraps of the destroyed silk ink stone bag clutched in his hands. His stared at the doorway leading to the kitchen. He thought of the whip upstairs. Guan-jiah was right. The whip and the pain it would deliver was his only choice, but he couldn’t make himself go up those stairs to get it.

  The Angry voices in the kitchen continued. “Do not think you are the only one with power. I have power too. I will make him sell you before you make him sell me. Do not forget that I am the one that carries his child. I am younger and
prettier than you are. I have dimples that he is wild about. Every time I smile, he sees my dimples and he forgets you.”

  Shao-mei’s voice escalated into a scream. There was the sound of a blow that came from a fist hitting flesh. Robert ran into the kitchen to see the sisters scratching at each other. Ayaou threw herself on Shao-mei. She wrapped both her arms around Shao-mei and lifted her off the ground. She squeezed and Shao-mei’s face started to turn purple.

  “The baby!” he said. “No!” He took hold of Ayaou’s arms and pried them from Shao-mei. The younger sister lost her balance and stumbled back. He forced his way between them. Ayaou attempted another blow. Tufts of hair floated in the air. Shao-mei, in her blind fury, scratched Robert’s face and blood started to ooze from the wound.

  After a few more blows from both sisters to Robert’s body, both girls stumbled back. They were stunned they had hurt him. He put a hand up to stop the bleeding and looked from one sister to the other. Shao-mei’s blouse was torn. Ayaou’s face was also scratched.

  “Robert, you must sell Shao-mei!” Ayaou said, breaking the paralyzing spell that had invaded the room. “She has gone mad! I was wrong to let her in. She is ungrateful. This is how she repays my kindness. With her claws! She does not belong in this house. She belongs to Captain Patridge and deserves to be treated like a prostitute. Sell her! It is too late for her to cry sorry, because I will not hear her. Let her go, Robert!”

  “See her, Robert!” Shao-mei said—her voice filled with desperation. “Ayaou has turned evil! She has wished me sickness, and she has wished me death. She wants this child to die in my womb. She does not care that I am your concubine too. If you let her stay, she will bring you bad luck?”