then upstream again, threading its way through the traffic, as everyone else was doing, until it should be time for the evening fireworks.
Wherever they went he was there, watching her from his little boat, passing, turning, returning, trailing her, sooner or later arriving where she was. Her brothers did not see him at all. He had a face they were used to, or unaware of, a blank face to them, not a rich, important face they would bother to launch her toward. Not even, she must admit, the handsomest face in the world…it was lopsided, there should perhaps be more space between the large eyes, more bridge to the nose… She longed to know his name, but how could she ask? She sat silent. Her brothers forgot her, busy with schemes of their own.
It was the best part of the day. People were friendly, relaxed, a little tipsy, a little tired, pleased with the bets they had placed, the plans they were making, each other. The music was softer, the singing more serious, night was ahead.
Now the last time downstream, through the descending darkness, warm, drowsy, her mind full of sights and sounds, faces seen obliquely, and one face, framed in the fireworks falling over the river, this side, that side, moonlit, shadowed…the prize she brought back with her from the Dragon Festival.
IX
THE MOON RODE HIGH AND FULL. Second Lady was restless. Hung Tu heard her stirring and rose to join her. The divisions of day and night meant little to her mother now. The edges of things were confused. Sometimes she lay in bed all day and resisted being fed; then, if there were a moon, she would get up suddenly, dress, do her hair, put on ornaments, eat what she found, and play and sing for hours.
“Disturbing her honorable husband, Elder Sister, the household”… nothing stopped her. She heard no remonstrances, understood no advice. Music was all she wanted. Sometimes she held out flute or p’i-pa or gestured toward her harp.
“Harmonize with me now, never mind the hour, make music,” the gentle gestures said. If they begged her to stop, she did not hear them. If they tried to take the instrument from her, she screamed and got her way. Neither Hung Tu nor the servant Fanyang who nursed her could bear Second Lady to be discovered then by anyone, especially by Elder Sister. Fortunately, so far no one who heard the music or the screaming had cared to rouse Elder Sister from the richness of her snores.
It was known in the household that Second Lady grew worse, though not, Hung Tu hoped, the nature of her illness. Fanyang asserted sturdily that her lady suffered a decline in strength after childbirth. She invented reassuring symptoms and told them round the well. Some said, “Ah, poor Second Lady,” with genuine sympathy. Others disguised their pity under a lack of interest, politic to assume. The nearer they were to Elder Sister, the greater the indifference. But even these contrived at safe moments to let Hung Tu know how they felt. Some of them sent messages and little gifts of food or embroidered socks to the pavilion for Second Lady. Hung Tu and Fanyang made the most of these.
“You see,” they said, “here is another peach—or an apple, or a cake—how everybody loves you! Now you must lie down—or sit up and eat this—and get well.”
Sometimes Second Lady nodded, her lips said “kind, kind.” Sometimes she did not hear them. The circle of her notice was narrowing.
Hung Tu thought her father knew the truth. His visits were rare and short, always in the morning, and often he sent word to know if Second Lady had passed a restful night and would be able to receive him. Hung Tu answered for her and left them together when he came. When he clapped his hands she came quickly and served him tea, and offered it to her mother if she seemed to be noticing the cup. Then Hsueh Yun would go away, heavily. It was a different step from the one she remembered through the years, departing from that house. But he said nothing to her and she could say nothing to him.
It was a long time since his sleeping mat was spread in Second Lady’s pavilion, nor was it spread more often in Elder Sister’s now. Fanyang said he slept alone, in a little room near his office. She said there was no woman taking Second Lady’s place, but Fanyang might be lying. She would cheerfully lie to bring relief or comfort to anyone she liked. Hung Tu thought it true. She pitied her father as much as she pitied her mother. She wished that she could talk to him, not only for his sake. She needed help, advice, orders, recognition of her existence…
It was a fortnight now since the Dragon Festival. She had tried to tell her mother, at first in words, and then by using music, some of the sights of the river, some of her thoughts. She composed a River Song, full of love, spring, shimmering water, boats, young, ardent lovers, and a bridegroom “eternally constant, One who knows the Sound, the Same-Heart One,” using these characters from her mother’s songs to lead into the subject of marriage.
Second Lady smiled politely. She patted her daughter’s cheek, but her eyes were blank, her attention far away. There was no one Hung Tu could speak to about the man on the river. Her hope was that he must know who she was. He could find out easily. He only had to contact her brothers. They were known everywhere. They would take him to her father. Then he would make his offer, and after he had gone they would send for her and tell her, “Your husband is So-and-So, who does such-and-such,” and she would be properly astonished.
Perhaps he had come already. Perhaps he had sent his father, or his uncle, or some other go-between, to make the offer for him. Perhaps they were still haggling. Perhaps he was poor and could not give what they asked…she would marry him anyway. Perhaps they were favoring someone else, one of those old robes, who would offer more…she would run away, she would kill herself…she would take the saffron robe. Then one day he would come to the Cloud Touching Temple, and listen to her playing the reed flute and turn monk too… No, they would be married, they must marry.
But why did no one tell her anything? Why was it so long? Her father came and went and was never there. Since the Dragon Festival her brothers came and went and were never there. They had washed their hands of her. Perhaps they considered one picnic on the river enough. Or perhaps they had noticed her shameless behavior. More likely they were in trouble over women or money which they must hide from their father.
He was in trouble too, with the starving hordes at the other end of the valley. There was famine and plague among them, and they were breaking loose in packs of desperate men, ready to kill for a handful of rice. They were following several leaders. The one most talked about was Pockmark Chou, a bandit chief from the North, who brought his army with him when he came and was adding hundreds to it every day. They might even march on the city, if the frightened whispers and the news told round the well were true.
That old fox, with his legend. Every day there were more stories about his growing power, his loot, his cruelty, his rough rasping wit, his playful way with torture. He got what he wanted. He walked among his army of beasts and they were obedient. He kept them constantly surprised. The talk was all of his strength, his virility.
Hung Tu listened with half an ear. Her mind was full of two preoccupations, her mother’s growing disorder, beginning to be thought of as madness, and her own obsession, also a madness. Her whole being was languid with first love. Every day she expected would bring news of him, at least the revelation of his name, and every night she went to her restless broken sleep no wiser.
X
SHE WAS IN THE GARDEN when the screaming began, high-pitched and terrible. As she ran toward it, sound and direction changed, so that she realized it was not her mother’s voice. These inhuman awful sounds were coming from Elder Sister’s pavilion.
Hurrying servants rushed past her as she hesitated in the doorway.
“What is it? Oh, what is it?”
No one answered. Then she saw Hsueh-Tai crossing the courtyard.
