A Flower’s Shade Page 8

  "Why should I go, just because she sends for me?" Xiaoyun said, full of pride. "My name is Yuan Xiaoyun, and I am not her servant boy. Who's ever heard of such a thing? So what if she is the lady of the house? Just because she says something, or sends word, telling me to do something—why should I do that? What gives her the right?"

  10

  With a bang, the furious Miss Yu had hurled a teacup to the ground, smashing it to pieces. Xiaoyun's arrogance had incurred her wrath. "And what else did he say?" Huaifu had returned, stammering his report that Xiaoyun refused to return, with Miss Yu responding with irate inquiries. During the interval, she had sat the whole time in front of her dressing table making herself pretty. Having waited a long time for Xiaoyun, she had stored up considerable anger. Now Huaifu had finally come, and this was the news he brought.

  Huaifu stood humbly by, not daring to make a sound. Miss Yu's tempers were a common occurrence. But smashing teacups, like today—this was something new. Even though the anger was not directed at him, but, as they say: if the city gates are on fire, the fish in the moat suffer too. There was nowhere for him to hide, and of course the matter did in a way concern him. "You're so useless. I ask you to fetch someone and it takes you forever. If he won't come, then just come back, why stand farting around waiting for him? You shouldn't beg from him!" When Miss Yu was angry, she liked to use the word 'fart'. Whether or not it was reasonable, she always began by abusing Huaifu to let off steam. "Let me hear you say again what he told you." Miss Yu compelled him to repeat his words again.

  Huaifu stammered, saying, "He…he didn't say much…"

  Miss Yu forcefully unbound the two braids, then, looking at herself in the mirror, ran her fingers through her hair at random and turned on her heels. She was mumbling, and rushed off to confront and punish Xiaoyun. All Huaifu saw was her form vanishing quickly down the corridor, and after a moment she couldn't be seen at all. Huaifu, panicking, cantered off in pursuit. He hadn't thought she would take it so seriously. If Miss Yun and Xiaoyun really did have a big argument, there would be no way of making reason heard between the two fiery spluttering young people. He had a groundless fear that Xiaoyun would deny everything, which would make it seem like Huaifu had been deliberately stirring up trouble between them.

  Miss Yu, fuming with anger, entered her sister-in-law's courtyard. Zha Liangzhong had already left, and Suqin and her brother had both gone into their rooms. Only Ai'ai and Naixiang were in the courtyard, Ai'ai pushing Naixiang about in his wheelchair, and having entered the courtyard at the same time. Without regard for propriety, Miss Yu rushed right into her sister-in-law's room, and screamed at her, "Where's Xiaoyun? I have something to say to him."

  Suqin greeted Miss Yu, but Miss Yu really couldn't be bothered to pay any attention to her. She turned and bolted out of the room, stood in the courtyard and screeched in the direction of Xiaoyun's room, "Xiaoyun, are you there, if you are, come out here this minute, don't hide your head like a tortoise in his shell, you coward!"

  Obviously, Xiaoyun had heard her yelling. But as if nothing was the matter, he poked his head out of the window, and looked silently at Miss Yu. Miss Yu was so busy shouting at the door that it took a moment before she saw Xiaoyun at the window.

  Xiaoyun was still wearing his dark glasses. As long as he had the dark glasses on, he gave people the feeling that he was wearing a mask. Now that his face had become an enigmatic mask, Miss Yu discovered that she was speechless. The strangeness of his appearance quenched a good deal of her anger.

  Through the window, Xiaoyun said emotionlessly, "What's all this anger? Having troubled to come here yourself, what do you command?"

  "You…" Miss Yu was speechless for a moment. She had been angry, but just what she had wanted Xiaoyun for, she couldn't say herself. "Come out."

  "Just tell me this: what difference does it make?"

  "Come out!"

  Xiaoyun emerged, neither very quickly nor too slowly. He raised his chin, as though expecting Miss Yu's next comment, but also as though he held her in no esteem at all, as if he was deliberately making light of her. Miss Yu ground her teeth as she looked at him, and still said nothing. It seemed like everyone in the courtyard: Ai'ai, as well as Suqin, and Naixiang in his chair—it seemed they were all waiting to see how Miss Yu would deal with Xiaoyun.

  Miss Yu finally blurted out, "What's the big deal with you?"

  Xiaoyun indicated that he did not quite understand what she meant.

  Miss Yu said again, "So you went out for a couple of days and saw what the modern world was like. What's the big deal about that?"

  Almost like an admission of guilt, Xiaoyun said, "Of course I'm no big deal. When I was a child, I depended on my sister. Now I'm grown up, and I'm still eating her food, and I know—if I'm eating our food, then it's really you Zhens who are feeding me. What you say is true, madam, what big deal could there possibly be about someone like me?

  This little speech of Xiaoyun's caused a great deal more of Miss Yu's anger to vanish. Xiaoyun's attitude often perplexed her, it was neither arrogant nor subservient, or rather it was alternately arrogant and subservient, like he was playing a game with her. Miss Yu's anger having been reduced almost to nothing, Xiaoyun's next words caused it to flare up again. Of course there is no big deal about me, Yuan Xiaoyun. But as for you, madam, what's the big deal with you?" He turned around and looked at her very affectedly, "Madam, you're nothing but a rich little girl, not to put too fine a point on it, a rich little girl is all you are. Let me tell you, rich little girls are thick on the ground. Perhaps—perhaps having a little bit of money is not such a big deal either, am I right?"

  Miss Yu, having swallowed this response, found she was speechless. In high dudgeon, she turned and left.

  11

  No one had ever dared to treat Miss Yu in such a way. Returning to her own rooms, all Miss Yu could think about was how to straighten out Xiaoyun. This time, she felt that she certainly could not spare Xiaoyun. He oughtn't to think that just because he'd read a few books or had a couple of days of modern education that he had a right to mock her in this way. She believed herself to be very angry, although actually she was not all that enraged. Perhaps all that Xiaoyun said was true, for Miss Yu knew that everybody supposedly feared her, but it amounted really only to indulging her. And why should everybody either fear her or indulge her?

  As the weather got warmer and warmer, Miss Yu's temper also got increasingly irascible, increasingly bizarre. Although she had seen Xiaoyun again, the event had not brought many memories of childhood back to her. She could remember that she had often bullied him when they were small, and that for this reason Xiaoyun had always timidly hid from her. She could remember Xiaoyun as an introverted boy, always fearfully avoiding her. At the time, Xiaoyun had not been tall, but he had big eyes, good-looking eyes, although he never dared to look straight at a person. Hard to believe that this bullied boy was now so full of himself.

  Xiaoyun's arrogance afforded a different kind of temptation. Compared to the other men she had seen, Xiaoyun was the only one who was ready to really stand up to her. Contradiction often has unexpected consequences. Sometimes, contradiction can be attractive. Miss Yu knew that she had never really been angry with Xiaoyun. It seemed like she deliberately wanted to give Xiaoyun a chance. As an old maid, Miss Yu had practically no experience dealing with men. The opposite sex had for her an extraordinary attraction. After the death of Old Master Zhen, when Miss Yu had acquired full power over the family property, she had more than once entertained visions of how she might interact with the opposite sex. After all, from the age of seventeen, she had been an avid reader of The Plum in the Golden Vase. With regard to sex, she had for years endured extraordinary repression. Even before the death of Old Master Zhen, she had imagined how she might become indecent and debauched. This was the unspeakable secret of an old maid without any sexual experience. It had surprised even her that when she had heard the news of her father's death, her first impulse was
not to grieve at her father's death, but rather to entertain a burning if unfulfilled desire to find some random man to sleep with.

  Lying in the bathtub, Miss Yu fondled her overripe body, feeling wronged by the passing of the spring of her youth. In the era in which Miss Yu lived, it was a catastrophe if a woman was not married by the age of twenty. Many girls had become mothers by the age of fifteen or sixteen. Miss Yu, growing up in the closed environment of her Estate, had received her sexual education not from her frequent readings of The Plum in the Golden Vase but rather from the womanizing of her father and brother. Their unrestrained sexual life had made the Estate for many years seem like a den of iniquity, little different from a brothel.

  One stuffy summer night, Miss Yu had gone out into the back garden to get some fresh air. Two of her brother's concubines were also there for the same reason. The sky was filled with stars, and there was finally a cool breeze. Miss Yu had dozed off without realizing it, and when she awoke the two women were quite close, brazenly relating their sexual sensations. Perhaps they thought Miss Yu was sleeping, or perhaps they were speaking so that she would hear. In any event, their voices were not so low, and they concealed nothing, although they kept on chuckling and chortling. They spoke in specific and vivid detail, rating Naixiang's technique. Naixiang had by this time already become an invalid, and the two women shared a lamentable fate; gossip was the only outlet they had for their dissatisfaction. They talked about this and that talking and talking until the topic turned to Miss Yu herself.

  Miss Yu heard one of the concubines lower her voice to say, "What can the old master be thinking? His daughter's so old and yet he doesn't get her married off."

  The other concubine answered, "The old stinker only thinks about his own pleasure. He's not too bothered about his daughter. Let me tell you, men are all the same. All they know is they want it, but what they don't know is that actually we women want it too. You think she's not anxious to be married? For better or worse, the two of us have had a taste of men."

  "You don't know about her. The more you've had men, the more you want it. But when we were still maidens, we didn't think about that at all…"

  They had deliberately lowered their voices, as though they were afraid that Miss Yu would wake up and hear them. For many years, Miss Yu had regretted that she hadn't stood up and given the two shameless concubines a verbal thrashing to their faces. Perhaps they were right about one thing, and that was that Miss Yu truly did want her taste of men. But she didn't want it the way they imagined, anxious to find a man of any kind to marry and have done with it. In fact, Miss Yu was not anxious to be married soon. It is not necessarily the same thing to want marriage and to want men. All men are vile, if they have any kind of standing at all, they'll want all kinds of wives and concubines. Miss Yu had long since considered what would be the outcome if she were to get married. Her father and brother had so many concubines, so why would her own man be an exception? Why should it be so unfair between men and women, with men being permitted to have many women, but women got only one man, and they had to fight tooth and nail for him to boot?

  Miss Yu decided that she would make the Zhen Residence into a real woman's world. She was the mistress of this world, and in this world of hers men would have to become like women. She would make all of the men in this Estate follow her commands, make them scheme and grow jealous of her favor, make them fight for her till the blood flowed. She would wreak a cruel vengeance for womankind, oppressed for thousands of years.

  What, after all, was Xiaoyun? It wasn't on his account that she would wrestle with her conscience or stay angry for any length of time. Going to bed that night, she believed she had already found the right way of dealing with him. She was sure that she had already conquered him, and as she imagined the scene of her total victory, she went to bed with a smile on her lips.

  12

  For many years Miss Yu had wanted to explore the Mystery Chambers, but once she became the mistress of the Estate, she did not hurry to enter them. Of all the buildings in the Zhen Estate, the Mystery Chambers were the most enigmatic, and they were also the only place that Old Master Zhen had not allowed her to set foot. Miss Yu knew that his place was the scene of her father's romances, knew that this was the spot where he and the concubines sought their pleasure. Miss Yu could remember having secretly once gone into the Mystery Chambers. At the time she had been only sixteen, and she had been led there unsuspectingly by the sounds of a woman's moaning that filtered out. Because her father had told her many times never to enter the Mystery Chambers, she had gone up the stairs, quietly as a cat. The woman's moaning had become more and more intense. The first thing Miss Yu saw through a hole in the paper window was an enormous charcoal brazier set in the middle of the hall, a bright red brazier that caught the eye. The next thing she saw was her naked father standing by the edge of the bed, thrusting forcefully. The moans were coming out of the mouth of the woman lying on the bed. This was when Miss Yu saw for the first time a man's thing, for he suddenly stopped the action, struck the woman on her behind, had her change positions, and began all over again. In that moment the stiff thing gave Miss Yu a great fright. All of a sudden Miss Yu began to figure out what it was all about. A year later, having secretly read The Plum in the Golden Vase, she had filled in all the missing bits in her understanding.

  In the end, Miss Yu took Huaifu to the Mystery Chambers. After the death of Old Master Zhen, this was the first time she officially decided to go into this building. It seemed that she already knew what was concealed inside. Like an adventurous child in search of a treasure, she was excited and curious as well as slightly afraid. Unaware of the truth, Huaifu followed her unsuspectingly. Even in Yaoshan village, accounts of the Mystery Chambers were widely known, but Huaifu didn't know at the time where he was going with Miss Yu. He only knew that he was willing to do whatever Miss Yu commanded.

  Just as they were going up the stairs, they saw Ai'ai nearby, pushing Naixiang in their direction. Ever since Huaifu had moved into the Zhen Estate, he had frequently run into Naixiang, roaming about. The impression Naixiang made on him was of a living corpse, for whom each breath might be his last, always making abrupt appearances in front of people. Huaifu had noticed that Miss Yu had seemed to hesitate upon seeing the wheelchair. She had stopped upon the staircase, a little squeamish, though at the same time she had looked at Naixiang with contempt. Huaifu had been able to sense that there was some kind of uncompromising hostility between these two siblings. Miss Yu seemed never to pay him any attention.

  Miss Yu fished out a large bunch of keys, and tried them each on the lock. Having tried several, none of which worked, she became impatient and gave the keys to Huaifu. Huaifu had fumbled with the keys, and after much fiddling, he had finally got the door open. With a click, the door finally opened, and an extraordinary scene presented itself to their eyes.

  It was a room, elegantly appointed, and permeated with an old-fashioned ambience of decadence. On the opposite wall hung a painting of The Precious Concubine Emerging from Her Bath by an old master. Above the wide opium bed hung an enormous mirror in which could be seen a great carved rosewood bed with the edges of the frame trimmed with erotic scenes carved in shell. There was a collection of strange bottles and jars on a long table, all of them in cloisonné. Miss Yu casually picked up a lid on the reverse of which, incredibly, was a painting of a naked man and woman in the act of union. Miss Yu's suddenly blushed, and instinctively hastened to replace the lid. She noticed that Huaifu's eyes had already strayed elsewhere, and so, full of curiosity, she opened the bottle again and took a quick look at the lid, and again replaced it after a few moments. In a round little bottle Miss Yu discovered some pills. She picked one of the tiny, exquisitely carved pills out, and put it on her fingertip to examine closely. She knew that these were the aphrodisiacs her father had used to take, they might even have been made according to the prescriptions described in The Plum in the Golden Vase. It was on account of these aphrodisi
acs that Old Master Zhen's women had abandoned themselves to ceaseless moaning. And it was also these aphrodisiacs that had caused his sexual overindulgence, and his sudden death in the arms of a woman. It was rather dark in the Mystery Chambers and Miss Yu told Huaifu to open one of the western windows. Huaifu did so, walked over and after some struggle managed to open the window. A ray of golden sunlight fell in. Miss Yu considered the pills in her hand once more against the dazzling light.

  Huaifu was looking uneasily about, glancing now at Miss Yu, now at the furnishings of the Mystery Chambers. Suddenly, his gaze alighted on The Precious Concubine Emerging from Her Bath. The Precious Concubine was wearing only a thin veil, rippling with vernal passions, her eyes looking at him in drowsy languor. Beneath this gaze, charged with innuendo, Huaifu felt highly uncomfortable. In order to cover this discomfort, Huaifu averted his eyes and looked at the lid of the cloisonné bottle that Miss Yu had opened. Though the lid was on, it was as though Huaifu's eyes could see through the lid, for though his gaze had only passed over it, the image of the united naked and woman was already branded on his mind.

  Huaifu was uncomfortable, and Miss Yu felt equally ill-at-ease. Although she was familiar with The Plum in the Golden Vase, and had been in a sense theoretically precocious about the matter, she was after all an old maid. At this time, in this place, in this situation, here she was with a living, breathing man. It seemed suddenly to have occurred to her that Huaifu was a man, too. Ever since he had come into the Zhen Estate, she had never considered him as a real man. Or, to put it another way, she had never considered him at all. But in the atmosphere of the Mystery Chambers, Miss Yu's heart began involuntarily to beat faster. She couldn't help but glance at Huaifu.