Imperial Woman

by Pearl S. Buck

  At sunset the imperial procession approached the gate of the Summer Palace itself and, peering through the cracks between her curtains, Tzu Hsi saw the lofty gate of carved white marble, guarded by two golden lions. It was open and waiting, and she was carried over the high threshold and into the quiet of the vast park. Now she could not forbear opening her curtains with her hands to look out and she saw a dreamlike scene. Pagodas hung as though suspended on the green hillsides, clear brooks ran smoothly rippling beside the winding roads paved with marble, and bridges carved of white marble led the way to a hundred pavilions, each different from the others and beautiful in gold and colored tile. A lifetime would not be enough to know it all. And with much that she could see, there was more unseen, the great palaces themselves, designed so long ago and enriched by every emperor in his time, the famous water clock whose twelve animals spouted water from the Fountain of Jade, each for two hours at a time. And every palace, so she had heard, was filled with treasures not only of the East but of Europe and the West. Her pleasure-loving soul rejoiced and she was impatient to be free to wander as she would.

  At sunset she felt her palanquin set down, the curtains put aside by Li Lien-ying, and she rose as one who greets a fairy country, bewitching and unknown. She looked about her and by a strange chance at this very moment her look fell, unwary and unprepared, on Jung Lu. He stood alone, his men behind the Emperor, whose palanquin was already at the great Hall of Entrance. Not expecting, he lifted up his head and looked into the eyes he knew so well. She caught his look, and he caught hers, and for one instant their hearts entangled. They turned their heads in haste, the moment passed. Tzu Hsi entered her assigned palace and her ladies followed. But a sudden happiness sprang up in her. She overflowed with lively joy at all she saw as she went from one room to another. This palace, now hers, was named the Palace of Contentment. It was old, and its very age enchanted her. Here emperors and their courts had come for pleasure and to escape from their burdens, and here they had found peace in gaiety. When she had seen all that could be seen today she returned to its entrance and standing upon the threshold of the wide doors, thrown open to the sunset, she stretched out her arms to the landscape, exquisite and calm in the clear brightness of the evening sun.

  “The very air is mellifluous,” she said to her ladies. “Breathe it, and feel how light it is in the lungs! Compare it with the weight of the air inside the city walls!”

  The ladies breathed in as she commanded and they cried out their agreement with her. Indeed, the air was pure and cool but not chill.

  “I wish I could spend all my life here,” Tzu Hsi exclaimed. “Would that I need never return to the Forbidden City!”

  Her ladies cried out against this. How, they inquired, could she be spared in that center of the nation’s life?

  “At least let us not speak of anything not joyful,” Tzu Hsi insisted. “Whatever is sorrowful or rouses anger or gives pain must here be forgotten.”

  Her ladies agreed to this in a chorus of mild murmurs and sighs, and Tzu Hsi, eager to continue her discovery of the manifold variety of palaces and gardens, lingered in the doorway. Alas, the day was at its end, the sun slipped down behind the spires of the pagodas, and the afterglow faded from the lakes and streams. Soon even the shadows of the marble bridges no longer lingered upon the waters, and the day was ended.

  “I shall retire early,” Tzu Hsi said, “and I shall rise at dawn. However many tomorrows are allotted to this joyful place, they will not be enough to see all that is to be seen here or to take our fill of pleasure.”

  Her ladies agreed and the moon had scarcely risen before Tzu Hsi went to her own apartments. A light meal of sweetmeats and tidbits was served to her, she drank her favorite green tea, and then, bathed and in fresh silk garments, she lay down to sleep. At first she said she could not sleep, so sweet was the night air, and twice, after her weary women slept, she rose from her bed to look from the open windows. The palace stood high above the low encircling walls, and she could see beyond them to the distant mountains, pale in the moonlight. Peace stole over her spirit, so deep a peace that it seemed the prelude to sleep itself, and yet she was awake in every sense. Before her lay the golden moonlit landscape, she smelled the fragrance of night-blooming lilies, she heard the clear call of the harvest bird, early in its season. Her loneliness subsided, the fear of wars and troubles died away, her impetuous heart grew gentle and her thoughts kindly. Beyond the terrace, to the right, stood the Palace of the Floating Cloud, assigned to Sakota. Tomorrow—no, not tomorrow, but some day when her happiness was full enough she would stay by her resolve and renew her sisterly friendship with Sakota. How strange to think that they who had grown up beneath the same roof in Pewter Lane should now live side by side in their two palaces, their one lord the Emperor!

  And then, because her mind was never long at rest, she thought of Jung Lu, her kinsman, and how she had seen him for a moment today, how their unwary eyes had met, had clung and then had parted again, unwillingly, and she longed fiercely, of a sudden, to hear his voice and know him near. And why should she not summon him as her kinsman—say, for some advice she needed? What advice did she need? Her mind roamed in search of its excuse. Her promise to her mother, still unredeemed, her promise to wed her sister to a prince—for that, surely, she could ask advice from a kinsman? And her own eunuch, her faithful one, Li Lien-ying, to him she could say honestly:

  “I have a family matter, a promise I made to my mother, and I wish to ask my kinsman, the Commander of the Imperial Guard—”

  The moonlight grew more golden, the air more fragrant than it had been and she sighed with happiness. Here in this magic place, could not magic be accomplished? She smiled at herself with secret mockery. There was an edge to her joy, a thin sharp edge of old desire, a teasing memory waking to renew itself. Well, let it be no more, she thought. She need not put a guard upon herself—he would do that. His rectitude would be her guard, the lock to which he held the key. Him she could trust, for he could not be corrupted.

  Suddenly she longed for sleep and stealing to her bed and walking softly among her women sleeping on their pallets on the tiled floors, she parted the curtains and lay down.

  The morning dawned clear again and calm, a day without wind, yet cooled by some distant northern storm, and she let this day pass, forgetful of everything except her childlike pleasure in what she saw about her. Many days must pass before she could see all there was to see, for when palaces and lakes and courtyards, terraces and gardens and pavilions were visited, there remained the treasure houses, the annexes to Yüan Ming Yüan, and in these were stored the gifts that had been given for two hundred years to the emperors of the ruling dynasty. Silks by lots of a thousand bolts apiece, furs by bales from beyond the Siber River, curios from every nation in Europe and from the British Isles, tributes from Thibet and Turkestan, gifts from Korea and Japan and all those lesser nations who, though free, acknowledged that their guide and leader was the Son of Heaven, fine furniture and precious wares from southern provinces, jades and silver toys and boxes, vases of gold and gems from India and the southern seas, all these waited for her searching eyes and quick hands to judge their weights, shapes and textures.

  And in the evening of every day, by the Emperor’s command, a play was presented to the Court by the Imperial Players, and for the first time Tzu Hsi could indulge to fullness of her desire her love of theater. She had read books about the past, and she had studied well the old paintings and writings, but in the plays she saw men and women of history come to life again before her eyes. She lived with other consorts and empresses, and saw her own self, born earlier to rule and die. And thoughtful thereafter she went to bed at night if the play were thoughtful, and merry if the play were merry, and whatever she did was all pleasure.

  Among the treasures which she mused upon more than the rest was the library which the Ancestor Ch’ien Lung himself had caused to be collected and created from the great books of the past of four thous
and years. By his command these books had been copied by the scholars of his reign into one vast treasure. Two sets of the manuscripts these scholars made, the one to remain in the Forbidden City and the other here, lest fire or invading enemies destroy either. Tzu Hsi had not herself laid hands upon these libraries which the scholars had made, for inside the city the one was stored in the Hall of Literary Glory and kept under lock and key, except for a single season each year, this at the Feast of Classics, when it was the duty of the highest scholars to take out the ancient writings and expound their meaning to the Emperor, then ruling. For ever since the First Emperor eighteen hundred years ago had burned the books and buried scholars to put an end to ancient learning, and make himself supreme, it had been the first care of scholars to preserve books by teaching reverence for them, first from the Emperor and then from all his subjects, and that the words of the sage Confucius could not be destroyed by willful rulers, the Four Books and the Five Classics were even carved on stone and these stone monuments stood in the Hall of Classics, whose gates were barred. But here at Yüan Ming Yüan Tzu Hsi, though a woman, could read the ancient writings and so she promised herself she would do, if on a day it rained, or if she were sated with the sights to be seen.

  Yet whatever she did for some twenty days, not only while she enjoyed outdoor feasts upon the imperial houseboats with the Court, not only while she walked among the flower gardens, or played with her imperial son, who throve in this pure air, not even when she was summoned to the Emperor’s bedchamber, she did not forget her wily wish to speak again with Jung Lu, her kinsman. It lay twisted in her brain, that enchanting plan, the germ within a seed, ready to come to life when she so chose.

  One day, made reckless with much freedom and incessant pleasure, she did so choose, and suddenly deciding, she beckoned Li Lien-ying to her side, waving her jeweled fingers to him. He was always near and always watching and when he saw her raised hand, he came at once and knelt before her, his head low, to hear what she would command.

  “I find my mind troubled,” she said in her clear imperious voice. “I cannot forget a promise I made to my birthmother concerning the marriage of my younger sister. Yet the months pass and I do nothing. Meanwhile at my childhood home they wait anxiously. Yet to whom can I turn for good advice? Yesterday I remembered that the Commander of the Imperial Guard is our kinsman. It is he alone who can help me in this maternal family matter. Summon him to come to me.”

  She said this purposely before her ladies, for she who was so high could have no secrets. Let all know what she did. When she had spoken she sat calmly on her pretty throne, a seat delicately carved and inlaid with ivory from the tusks of elephants of Burma. Around her stood her ladies, and they heard and made no sign of any thought not innocent.

  As for Li Lien-ying, he knew his sovereign well by now and when she spoke he obeyed at once, for nothing could rouse her temper higher than delay in what she wished. The thoughts in that dark heart of his none knew and none asked, but surely he remembered another day when he had obeyed such a command and had brought Jung Lu to Yehonala’s door. In the courtyard outside the closed door that day the long hours of afternoon had crept by, while he had let none enter. Only he and the serving woman had known that Jung Lu was there. At sunset when the tall guardsman had come out, his face proud and troubled, they had not spoken, nor had Jung Lu so much as looked at the eunuch. The next day Yehonala had obeyed the summons of the Emperor. In ten moon months the Heir was born. Who could say—who could say? He went grinning and cracking his knuckles to find the Commander of the Imperial Guard.

  Where before she had received her kinsman in secret now Tzu Hsi received him openly and among her ladies. Seated on her throne in the great hall of her palace, she waited for Jung Lu. Magnificence became her, as always. The walls were hung with painted scrolls, behind the throne was an alabaster screen and porcelain pots of blooming trees stood to right and left. Her little dogs gamboled with four white kittens upon the floor, and here was the woman in the Empress. Tzu Hsi, in the midst of her splendor, laughed at her pets so much that at last she came down from her throne, possessed by mirth and playfulness. And while she went here and there she praised one lady for her fresh looks and another for her headdress and she trailed her silken kerchief to make the kittens follow her, and only when she heard the eunuch’s footsteps followed by a certain steadfast tread did she make haste to sit upon her throne again and fold her jeweled hands and look proud and grand, while her ladies smiled behind their fans.

  Her face was grave, her lips demure, but her great eyes sparkled when Jung Lu stepped across the high threshold of the entrance, wearing his guardsman’s tunic of scarlet satin and black velvet trousers. He took nine steps forward and did not raise his face to hers until he knelt. Then before he bowed his head, he took one full look at her he loved.

  “Welcome, cousin,” Tzu Hsi said in her pretty voice. “It has been a long time since we met.”

  “A long time, Venerable,” he said and waited, kneeling.

  She gazed down on him from her throne, the corners of her mouth deepening in a smile. “I have something to plead advice upon, and so I have summoned you.”

  “Command me, Venerable,” he said.

  “My younger sister is old enough to wed,” she went on. “Do you remember that child? A naughty wailing little thing, do you remember? Always clinging to me and wanting what I had?”

  “Venerable, I forget nothing,” he said, his head still bowed.

  Tzu Hsi received the secret meaning in these words and hid the treasure in her heart.

  “Well, now my sister needs a husband,” she went on. “She has outgrown her naughty ways and is a woman, very nearly, a slender pretty thing—fine eyebrows she always had—like mine!”

  Here she paused to lift her two forefingers and smooth her eyebrows, shaped like the leaves of a willow tree. “And I promised her a prince, but what prince, cousin? Name me the princes!”

  “Venerable,” Jung Lu replied carefully, “how can I know princes as well as you do?”

  “You do know them,” she insisted, “for you know everything. All is gossipped at the palace gates, I daresay.”

  She paused for him to answer and hearing not a word she changed her mood upon the instant, and turned upon her ladies.

  “Go—all of you,” she commanded. “You see my cousin will not speak before you! He knows that you will seize his words and scatter them as you go. Retire—retire, you listening ears—leave me with my cousin!”

  They fluttered off like frightened butterflies, and when they were gone, she laughed and came down from her throne. He did not move and she stooped and touched his shoulder.

  “Rise, cousin! There is no one near to see us, except my eunuch—and what is he? No more than a table or a chair!”

  He rose unwillingly and kept his distance. “I fear any eunuch,” he muttered.

  “Not mine,” she said heartlessly. “If he betrayed me by a word I’d pinch his head off as I would a fly’s.” She pinched her thumb and forefinger together as she spoke.

  “Sit down yonder on that marble chair,” she commanded, “and I will sit here—the distance is enough, I think? You need not fear me, cousin. I remember that I must be good. Why not? I have what I want—my son, the Heir!”

  “Be silent!” he cried in a low and angry voice.

  She lifted her dark lashes at him, innocently.

  “And what prince shall I choose for my sister?” she asked again.

  Sitting stiffly upon the edge of the chair she had assigned, he considered this question of a prince.

  “Of my lord’s seven brothers,” she mused, “to which one shall I give my little sister?”

  “It is not fitting that she be a concubine,” Jung Lu said firmly.

  She opened her eyes wide at him. “Why not, pray? Was I not a concubine until my son was born?”

  “To the Emperor,” he reminded her, “and now you are the Empress. The sister of an empress cannot be a concubi
ne even to a prince.”

  “Then I must choose the Seventh Prince,” she said. “It is only he who has no wife. Alas, he is the least handsome of all princes—that heavy mouth drawn down, the eyes dull and small, a proud solemn face! I hope my sister does not love beauty in a face as well as do I!”

  She looked sidewise at him from beneath her long straight lashes and he looked away.

  “Prince Ch’un’s face is not evil,” he rejoined. “It is lucky if a prince be at least not evil.”

  “Oh,” she said most mockingly. “You think that important? In a prince? Is it not enough that he be a prince?”

  He ignored her mockery. “I think it not enough.”

  She shrugged her shoulders. “Well, kinsman, if Prince Ch’un be your advice, I’ll choose him, and send a letter to my mother.”

  She was angry of a sudden at his hardness toward her and she rose to signify the audience was ended, then paused. “And you—” she said carelessly, “I suppose you’re wed by now?”

  He had risen with her and he stood before her, tall and calm. “You know I am not wed.”

  “Ah, but you must,” she insisted. A sudden happiness made her face soft and young, as he remembered it.

  “I wish you would wed,” she said wistfully and locked her hands together.

  “It is not possible.” He bowed and without farewell he left her presence and did not once look back.

  She stood there alone, surprised at his being so swiftly gone and before she had dismissed him. Then her quick eyes caught the movement of a curtain in a doorway. A spy? She stepped forward and twitched the curtain and saw a shrinking figure. It was Lady Mei, her pretty favorite, the youngest daughter of Su Shun.

  “You? Now why?” Thus Tzu Hsi demanded.

  The lady hung her head and put her forefinger in her mouth.

  “Come, come,” Tzu Hsi insisted. “Why do you spy on me?”