by Yangsze Choo
We gazed at the endless prairie in silence. Fan scanned the horizon from time to time and frowned. I had expected to find caverns, stalactites, and dungeons; the accoutrements of an underworld such as I had seen illustrated in painted scrolls. Nothing had prepared me for this. Despite the merciless glare, I couldn’t see the sun. The sky was evenly lit, which gave it an artificial air. Yet the overall effect was overpowering. With no landmarks, I had no way of knowing how many miles the grassland stretched out for, but it seemed like a great distance. After a time, I became aware of two dark shapes that drew steadily closer. Soon, a pair of coolies emerged from the long grass, carrying between them a shoulder pole with a basket slung under it.
“There they are,” said Fan. “My goodness, they look even worse than before.”
As they drew nearer I saw what she meant. They reminded me of the servants in Lim Tian Ching’s funeral mansions. But unlike Lim Tian Ching’s servants, their eyes and noses were roughly shaped, the mouths mere gashes in their lumpy faces. Their general appearance was much faded and worn and the contrivance they carried looked decidedly rickety. When they reached us, they bowed stiffly and dropped the basket to the ground. Fan climbed into it with some reluctance.
“It’s such an uncomfortable mode of transportation,” she said. “If only my father hadn’t been so stingy with me.” I refrained from pointing out that she was much luckier than the hungry ghosts, who had nothing at all. “Well, shall we be off, then?” she asked. Her porters picked up the carrying pole and hefted it briskly onto their shoulders. Then without a backward glance, they set off into the burning grassland.
Swinging myself onto Chendana, I followed after. My horse was faster so I held her back, which also relieved me from Fan’s constant conversation. Glancing at her swinging awkwardly in the basket, however, I couldn’t help feeling sorry for her. It seemed like a most uncomfortable mode of transportation to be tossed to and fro like a load of vegetables. From time to time I caught a glimpse of her white hand as she smoothed her hair, petting it as though it were a live animal.
Turning back, I noted that the passageway we had come from emerged from a range of hills. They were rocky and bare of vegetation, colored a deep oxblood red. It was an awe-inspiring yet dispiriting sight. There was not an insect or a bird that I spied along the way, and no flowers bloomed in the withered grass. It seemed impossible that rain ever fell on this desolate land. If I had been made of flesh and blood, I would surely have been burned in that ferocious light. Still, I wished I had a hat, and I had to improvise by pulling part of my pajama jacket over my head. As I did so, I felt the scale in my pocket that Er Lang had given to me. I was tempted to examine it again, but I didn’t wish to draw Fan’s attention to it. From time to time she glanced back, and her eyes were hard and bright.
We traveled for what seemed like hours. The glare began to fade from the sky until it was suffused with a curiously beautiful violet color. Urging Chendana forward to draw level with Fan, I asked, “What happens at night?”
“Oh, we just keep going,” she said. “I usually try to get this part of the journey over as soon as possible.”
It was easier for her, I realized, for despite the jolting motion of the basket, all she had to do was allow her porters to bear her tirelessly along. No doubt my little horse could walk all night, but I was afraid that I might fall off if I fell asleep, and I said as much to Fan. She frowned. “I hadn’t thought of that. I suppose we can stop and rest if you like.”
We made a makeshift camp in the grass. I had experienced neither thirst nor hunger since we had entered the Plains of the Dead, but despite that, I felt weary with a sense of being stretched ever thinner. Alighting stiffly, I walked around, stretching my arms until I noticed that my feet crunched on the coarse dry earth, and the grasses parted their bleached heads for me. For the first time in a long while, I had a physical impact on the world around me. Instead of relief, however, this discovery filled me with dread. I didn’t want to belong to this world. I wanted to go back to Malacca, my living, breathing Malacca, with its humid air and torpid days. Fan watched as I paced up and down. She had climbed out of her basketlike contraption and was now rearranging her hair, which, like the rest of her, seemed to have become more substantial than before.
“What are you looking at?” she asked.
I made a noncommittal noise and she fell silent. After a time, however, she said in a low voice, “I know you see differently than I do. What is it really like?”
In the growing darkness, her face was a pale blur. “Why do you want to know?” I asked.
Her voice faltered. “Sometimes I have a feeling that things aren’t what they seem. And I’m frightened of what comes next. If my lover doesn’t die with money, or if he doesn’t share it with me, then I must pass on to the Courts of Hell.”
She seemed so downcast that I couldn’t help feeling sympathy for her. “But after the courts is rebirth,” I said. “You might find happiness again.”
“Oh, rebirth isn’t the problem,” she said peevishly. “It’s what comes before. I’m afraid of the punishment for sins incurred in this life.”
“You were young when you died. Surely they won’t judge you too harshly.”
Fan looked away. “I’ve overstayed my time in the afterlife. That’s why I told you I seldom come to the Plains of the Dead anymore, even though I ought to. I’m not like you.” She cast an envious glance at me. “In the shop house I only receive those offerings to the hungry ghosts that my lover puts out. But he burns no clothes, nor shoes. I have to come back here to get what I can.”
“Why didn’t you ask him to burn funeral goods for you in his dreams?”
“When we’re together I don’t want to remind him that I’m dead. That would spoil everything.”
A pang struck me, for hadn’t I made exactly the same decision about Tian Bai? After all, the thought of embracing a corpse was hardly conducive to romance.
“And besides, he might exorcise me.” She made an impatient noise. “All these years I’ve been careful to make him think he’s only dreaming when he’s with me. I didn’t want him to find out that I was really haunting him. How do you think he would react? He’s so concerned with his health. A monk would have told him that I was sucking his life force out.”
“And were you?”
“Of course not!” she said. “Well, maybe a little here and there to supplement myself. He looks quite good for fifty-seven, don’t you think?”
Fifty-seven! I had thought the old man was in his eighties at least. No wonder Fan was in such terror of the authorities. I had thought it a simple case of overstaying, but clearly she had been involved in other trespasses. She turned a guileless face to me.
“That’s why I decided to come with you. If you’re from the heavenly realm, you should be able to help me with the authorities.”
Uneasily, I wondered what else Fan had concealed from me. Just then she gave a cry and flattened herself against the ground. Looking up, I saw swift dark shapes passing overhead. “What is it?”
“Down! Down!” she hissed. I threw myself on the coarse earth beside her. Whatever it was swooped over us, dipping and wheeling with a mewling wail. It was a sound like nothing I had ever heard, piercing and forlorn, yet dreadful in its intensity. Stifling the urge to bury my face in my hands, I glanced up furtively but the creatures were too fast. All I could see was that they flew strangely, as though they sheared the fabric of the air with sharp, triangular wings. They passed ominously low. Squeezing my eyes shut, I flinched as the wind from their passage flattened the grass around us. An instant later, they had lifted off and were gone, flying rapidly into the inky veil of night. After a time, I sat up but Fan remained facedown on the ground, trembling and shaking.
“What were those creatures?” I asked Fan.
She was silent for a while, but at last she said, “Most ghosts ignore them, but I heard t
hat they may be spies for the Courts of Hell.”
“I thought this was a place for human ghosts.”
“It is, though the border officials sometimes cross into here. But nobody really knows whether these flying creatures belong to them or not.”
“The border officials can come here?” Horrified, I’d been under the impression that nonhumans could not.
“Yes, but they seldom do.” Fan spoke in a low voice. “There are many things here that I don’t understand. That’s why I asked you earlier what you saw. Because surely your view of this place is different from mine.” Even as Fan pressed me to tell her how things appeared to me, some instinct warned me against it. She was not so easily put off, however. “Why won’t you tell me?” she asked, returning to her old petulance. It was as though that moment of vulnerability between us had never been.
At length she gave up and lay down next to her porters. They hadn’t flinched when those creatures had swooped down upon us, remaining as inanimate as the basket that lay between them. Chendana had at least snorted once, but she too hadn’t seemed unduly troubled. I reminded myself that my little horse was, after all, not a creature of flesh and blood. It was a sobering thought, but did not prevent me from huddling next to her and falling asleep.
Chapter 21
I was awoken by the gradual lightening of the sky. Just as the day before, there was no sun, merely a slow change in color as though a screened backdrop was rising upon a stage. A breeze rattled through the dry grasses, and once again I was struck by the utter lifelessness of the plain. Not far away, I could see Fan lying on her side, her eyes open. I wondered whether she had slept at all that night. I was glad, however, of the rest, even as I worried about how my physical body fared, far away in the world of the living. If something should happen to it, would there be any sign to warn me? Or perhaps I would be cut off, wandering forever in this sea of endless grass.
As soon as we were ready, Fan gave the order to her porters to start moving. “We’re almost there,” she called back to me.
I urged Chendana a little forward. “How do you know this?”
“Oh, it’s a feeling that I have near the cities and towns. It’s like a pull.”
“But I don’t see anything ahead.”
Fan laughed. She seemed to be in a much better mood than the previous day. “It doesn’t work like that! The towns appear at their own pace. That’s why I need my servants to find them. And that’s also why the hungry ghosts could never come here, because they have no funeral offerings to guide them.”
Looking back, I could see that we had left the rocky hills where the passageway emerged far behind. Instead of towering in the background, they were now mere bumps on the horizon. I was surprised at how much ground we had covered; in the real world, a journey of six or seven hours could hardly have served to distance ourselves so far. It made me anxious too about how time was passing here.
“There it is!”
Ahead of us was a faint shimmer that became more substantial as we drew nearer. The haze thickened around us until I began to see the outlines of streets and buildings filling in as we went forward, so that the road we were traveling became a broad avenue. There were shops and conjunctions of buildings that looked uncannily familiar. Down a side street I caught a glimpse of what looked like the Stadthuys, and from another, a brief view of a harbor lined with old-fashioned junks and frigates. It was beginning to look like Malacca, but far larger and devoid of the debris that often lined the streets. Some buildings were missing while others were replaced by gaudy monstrosities. The streets were silent and wide; the only people I saw were figures passing at a distance.
“Where is everyone?” I asked.
“There isn’t a large population,” said Fan. “Ghosts are always leaving when they’re called to the Courts of Hell.” She turned to me. “What do you mean to do now?”
I told her that I had some tasks to do, keeping the details as vague as possible. I was afraid that Fan would insist on accompanying me, but she seemed disinterested, telling me only that she meant to go to her house. “A shack is more like it,” she said. “Can you give me some money now?”
I had prepared myself for a request like this once we had arrived and gave her two strings of cash and some ingots, retaining a little for emergencies. “Is that all?” she asked, wrinkling her nose.
“I’m afraid so.”
“Oh, well. Thanks, I suppose. Do you need me to show you the way back afterward?”
“Yes. How long will you stay?”
“I think about ten days. I have some housekeeping matters to attend to.”
“If you show me where your house is, I’ll come to you at noon on the tenth day, or else send a message.”
“If you don’t come, I may leave without you. I dare not stay too long here.”
I agreed to this, and in surprisingly short order we arrived at her house. The twisting streets loomed out of the haze, winding haphazardly, making me afraid that I would be unable to find my way back. When I expressed this to Fan, she merely laughed. “That’s why we have servants. The buildings change when inhabitants leave, and new ones come with their own funeral offerings. Your horse will remember the way.” She drew to a halt.
“Well, this is my place,” she said. It wasn’t as bad as she had made it out to be, though dark and shaped like a box. I guessed that it must have originally been a simple paper model. Fan invited me in, but I declined. Somehow I did not like to pass through that narrow door.
“Why don’t you stay with me while you’re here?” she pressed.
In the end, I put her off with some vague words. Fan’s naked agendas gave me an uneasy feeling, and already I regretted the few pieces of information I had let slip.
After leaving Fan, I let Chendana wander through the streets for a while. As we went along I kept looking for familiar markers. Remembering the glimpse I had seen of the Stadthuys, I thought that if I could find it again I would surely have a better sense of where I was. The map that the Dutchman had drawn for me of the town was still impressed upon my mind, although I didn’t know whether that was due to his clarity or some other reason.
At last I saw the Stadthuys but, try as I might, could not approach it. Despite glimpsing it at the end of several streets, as soon as I went down them, it disappeared. Only upon looking back did it reappear like a mirage, around a corner or at the end of an alley. Frustrated, I thought to ask some of the pedestrians I saw at a distance. I drew near an ornate palanquin, but the shutters were drawn and I hesitated, remembering my glimpse of Lim Tian Ching on the street before and how he too had such a conveyance. While I stood there wavering, the shutters twitched and a shriveled face appeared.
“What do you want?” he said. “A young girl going about alone? What is your family thinking?”
I could only stammer before this onslaught, but the old man pried open the door and climbed out. “Recently dead, are you?” he asked. He was a wizened creature, bent with age. At the end of a scrawny neck, his head bobbed like a fishing weight. Yet he was surprisingly agile, circling me with interest. “Good horse,” he said. “They don’t make them like that anymore. Now it’s only cheap paper, not even cardboard!”
“I beg your pardon,” I said. “I just wanted to ask for directions.”
“Where do you want to go?”
“I was trying to get to the Stadthuys.”
He snorted. “The Stadthuys! It doesn’t exist here.” At the surprise on my face, he burst out into a cackle of laughter. “You can see it because it exists as a collective memory. All of us here who lived and died in Malacca expect to see the Stadthuys and the clock tower, but you can’t visit it because nobody actually burned a funeral copy of it. Cheh! I should have told my grandson to burn me one, then I would be the sole proprietor. But you, young lady. What are you doing by yourself without your servants? Who is your family? Where do
you live?”
Despite his peculiar behavior, I wondered if he might have some useful information, so I said, “Oh, Grandfather, I was just wondering where everything was. I’m so new here, you see.”
“Ask away! But in return you must tell me something about yourself. It’s only fair that I get some entertainment out of this.”
“So do the areas here correspond to the real Malacca?”
“Of course they do! Or almost nearly. But distances are very deceptive here.” He smiled cunningly. “You can spend days getting to some places and only minutes to reach others. It has to do with how things are connected to one another. Everything is relational here. Your house, your servants, your clothes—they all depend on someone else’s filial devotion to you. Look at me! When I died I had nothing to want for. Some of my descendants even went to the temple to pray that I would have a long and extended time to enjoy all these riches. But you see what happened?”
I jumped as his voice rose, and in the distance I saw several passersby quicken their steps to avoid us. Wondering whether I’d had the misfortune to run into a madman, I took a step back.
“I got stuck here for years!” He let out a howl of indignation. “Can you imagine that even my great-grandsons have died and passed on to the Courts of Hell already?” His eyes snapped back to me. “Now, why do you want to go to the Stadthuys?”
“I was just curious,” I said. “When I was alive I was never allowed out of the house.” He seemed satisfied by this, so I pressed on. “Did you say that the family mansions correspond to the same areas as they did in life?”
“Eh? Yes, by and large. Although there are some who were poor in life but were assiduous about burning funeral offerings, so that they’re now rich in the afterlife. But as soon as someone departs for the courts, then their possessions here vanish as well. Were you planning on visiting someone?”
I couldn’t resist the temptation. “I had a friend who was married to the Pan family and had a young daughter, but she died soon after.”