Pearl of China

by Anchee Min

  “Real home?” I sneered. “I’ll bet that you won’t even know where your front door is.” I asked Pearl if she knew the feng shui of her American home and was pleased that she had no answer.

  “Your house could be facing the wrong direction. Bad luck will stick to you forever!”

  “What if I tell you that I don’t give a damn if my American home has the wrong feng shui?” She picked up a rock and threw it into the valley. “It’ll be my mother’s home, not mine!”

  “But you will be living in it. You will be alone and miserable because you know better!”

  “I will have the company of my cousins!” she countered.

  I laughed and said that her cousins might know her name, but they would have no idea who she was and what she liked. “They won’t even care. To them you’ll be a total stranger!”

  “Stop, Willow, please,” she begged.

  We sat in silence and tried not to weep.

  The news regarding the Boxers got worse. They were seen in Soochow, which was less than a hundred miles from Chin-kiang. Carie tried to convince Absalom to temporarily relocate. Absalom wouldn’t consider it.

  “I won’t abandon God’s work” was Absalom’s answer.

  Carie threatened to leave on her own and said that she would take Pearl and Grace with her.

  “Mother told me that I must learn to trust in God and accept my destiny,” Pearl said. We held each other’s hands and sat on top of the hill. We watched the sun set without speaking another word.

  It felt like living in a bad dream. I imagined Pearl’s American house. According to Pearl, it was built by her grandfather. Pearl’s description of the house was word for word from Carie. “It is large and white with its pillared double portico set in a beautiful landscape,” she told me. “Behind the house are rich green plains and mountains.”

  I also imagined Pearl’s relatives, who all had milk-white faces. I imagined them receiving her warmly. They would hug her as if they knew her. They would say, “How are you, my darling? It’s been so long . . .” Pearl would be surrounded with clean sheets and soft pillows. She would be served plenty of food, but not the kind that she liked. No more Chinese food, of course. No more Chinese faces. No more Mandarin, or stories, or Peking operas. No more “Jasmine, Sweet Jasmine.”

  “I suppose I’ll get used to it.” Pearl gave out a long, deep sigh.

  She would be forced to adapt. She had no other option. She would forget China and me.

  “We might not recognize each other if we meet again,” Pearl teased.

  It was not funny, but I played along. “We probably wouldn’t even remember each other’s names.”

  “I might lose my Chinese.”

  “You will.”

  “Perhaps not,” she said. “I’ll try my best not to lose my Chinese.”

  “Maybe you’ll want to. What’s the use of Chinese in America? Who would you speak Chinese to? Grace? She’s too young. You two don’t play together. Maybe you will when you get to America. You won’t have a choice.”

  She turned her head and stared at me, her blue eyes big and clear. Tears began to well up.

  “You’ll be drinking milk and eating cheese.” I tried to cheer her up.

  “And I’ll turn into a big fat farmwife,” she responded. “My belly will be the size of a Chinese winter melon, with breasts like round squashes.”

  We laughed.

  “I could be married, you know,” I said. “NaiNai has already been approached by matchmakers. I could end up marrying an old, greasy rich man and be his concubine. He could be a monster and beat me every night.”

  “Wouldn’t that be awful?” She looked at me seriously.

  “Awful? What would you care? You will be gone by then.”

  Pearl’s hands reached out for me. “I’ll pray for you, Willow.”

  I pushed her away. “You know I have a problem with that. You haven’t been able to prove to me that your God exists!”

  “Then pretend that he does!” Pearl’s tears fell. “I need you to believe in him.”

  We decided to stop talking about the departure. We decided to celebrate our time together instead of wallowing in sadness. We went to see a troupe on wheels called the Great Shadow Art Show. It featured the Drunkard Monkey King and the Female Generals of the Yang Family. We had a wonderful time. Pearl was fascinated by the handmade shadow figures. The figures were created from scraped and sculpted cattle hides. The troupe master was from mid-China. He invited Pearl and me backstage, where he demonstrated how the figures worked. The actors hid under a large curtain, each holding a character with four bamboo sticks. The figures were able to tap their feet, dance to the rhythm, and fight a martial art battle while the owner sang in a high-pitched voice our favorite Wan-Wan tune.

  By early fall a children’s game was becoming popular. It was called Boxers and Foreigners. It was played by the rules of traditional hide-and-seek. The boys wouldn’t let Pearl and me join because we were girls. All day long Pearl and I sat on top of the hill sucking milkweeds. We watched the boys with envy. One morning Pearl came to me wearing an outfit of Western clothes she had borrowed from the British ambassador. It was a camel-colored jacket with copper buttons in the front and an open neck. The sleeves were wide at the elbow and tight on the wrists. The pants were made of brown wool. “It is their daughter’s horse-riding pants,” Pearl explained.

  When I asked why she had dressed up, Pearl replied, “We shall play our own game of Boxers and Foreigners.” She showed me a red-colored scarf. “This is your costume. Tie it around your forehead. You’ll be the Boxer and I’ll be the foreigner.”

  To make herself look more the part, she took off her black knitted hat and let her waist-long hair fall freely.

  I became excited. I wrapped the red scarf around my forehead like a turban.

  With wood sticks as our swords, we charged down the hill. The boys were stunned by Pearl’s appearance.

  “A real foreign devil!” they cried.

  Soon children begged to join us. Pearl became the leader of the foreign troops, while I was the chief of the Boxers.

  We threw rocks, ran around the hills, and hid in the bushes. In the afternoon, my group climbed onto the roofs of houses while Pearl led a door-to-door search for us. We roamed through the streets until it was dark.

  When it was time to round up the Boxers, my group let Pearl’s people tie our hands behind our backs. My group lined up to be executed. Pearl offered each of us an imaginary cup of wine, which we drank before reciting our last wish. When the shots were fired, we fell to the ground. We remained dead until Pearl announced that it was time to round up the foreigners.

  My group chased until Pearl and her people were captured. We tied the foreigners together like a string of crabs and paraded them through the streets. People were invited to watch the execution. Pearl had great fun shouting in English. The villagers were shocked at first, then they applauded and laughed with us.

  CHAPTER 8

  At Sunday service Absalom announced his family’s departure. “God will prevail” were his farewell words to the crowd. He promised to return as soon as he settled his family in Shanghai.

  “Monkeys will scatter when the tree falls,” Papa said. He was worried.

  Led by Absalom, the converts packed the church’s valuables and hid them within their own homes. Carie’s piano was a big problem. There was no way to hide it. Papa volunteered to go to Bumpkin Emperor and his sworn brothers for help. The warlords were enemies of the Boxers.

  The first thing Papa said to Bumpkin Emperor was “A smart rabbit digs three holes for security. If I were you, I wouldn’t miss this opportunity to make friends with the foreign god.” Papa went on to tell how the Western fleets had recently destroyed the Chinese Imperial Navy.

  Bumpkin Emperor took Carie’s piano and hid it in his concubine’s mansion.

  Carie was relieved. She thanked Papa. For the last time, she trimmed her roses and cleaned her yard. Watering each of her
plants, she broke down. She sat on the dirt and wept.

  Pearl and I exchanged farewell souvenirs. I gave her a pink silk fan painted with flowers. Pearl gave me a hairpin with a silver phoenix. She would be leaving in ten days, perhaps sooner.

  I shut my eyes and told myself to go to sleep that night. But my eyes stayed open. I tossed until dawn. NaiNai told me to forget about Pearl and to spend time with other girls in town. Over the next few days I tried, but without much luck. People didn’t care to be my friend. Since I’d begun to attend the church school, I had changed. I didn’t like the town girls, whom I considered narrow-minded and shallow. I couldn’t help but compare them with Pearl, who was kind, curious, and knowledgeable. The town girls fought over food and territory, and they fought among themselves. They could be best friends and worst enemies and best friends again all in one day. They often singled someone out to be the enemy of the moment. Then they attacked her by embarrassing her. I avoided them because I knew that Papa and NaiNai’s past would be used to torment me.

  Unlike peasant daughters, who were too burdened and exhausted to have time to themselves, the Chin-kiang town girls had time on their hands. Many of their parents were shop owners and merchants. They loved to pretend to be big-city girls. But they knew very little about the big cities, like Shanghai, where Carie once lived before Pearl was born. The Chin-kiang girls looked down on peasants. They made fun of their uncivilized habits and forgot that they were not much different.

  I had long accepted the reality that I was considered an odd character among the town girls. Catfighting didn’t suit me. Since I had become Pearl’s friend, I had been the target of these girls. The fact that Pearl and I were so close drove them mad. They watched us with jealousy and envy. Now I was having trouble. I couldn’t break into the town girls’ social circle. I feared that people would say I had been abandoned.

  I played cards with the town girls one afternoon. My heart ached for Pearl. She would be here only a few more days and I wanted to be with her. I forced myself to concentrate on the cards. One girl cheated and I caught her. She argued and denied everything. She didn’t mean aggression, nor did she say anything to provoke my anger, but I attacked her. I stopped the game and called the girl a liar. Step-by-step I exposed her tricks. The cards flew from my hands. The girl was embarrassed and exploded. No one was able to break us apart until Pearl arrived.

  Pearl knew it was not my character to fight with others. She knew that I was troubled by her departure. She carefully wiped the blood off my forehead with her handkerchief. The spot on my left cheek where my opponent had scratched me with her fingernails swelled. Looking at me with her gentle blue eyes, Pearl sighed.

  “I don’t need you here,” I said.

  “Does it hurt?” she asked.

  “No.”

  “It’s not like we won’t see each other forever,” she said in a soft voice.

  “But when? When will you come back?” I cried out.

  She was unable to answer.

  It was a clear day when Pearl’s family boarded a steamboat that came from the upper Yangtze River. The townspeople filled the pier to see them off. Papa, NaiNai, Carpenter Chan, Lilac, and their twins, Double Luck David and Double Luck John, and a newborn son were among the crowd. Absalom had recently baptized the boys and named the newborn Triple Luck Solomon.

  Absalom made Carpenter Chan promise to continue his work on the second floor of the new school until the job was finished. Reciting from the Bible, Absalom encouraged him, “It will be the offer of a sacrifice made by fire which ye shall offer onto the Lord.”

  Carpenter Chan nodded and gave his word.

  Wang Ah-ma begged Carie to take her with them.

  “My husband’s mind is set,” Carie told her tearfully. “You must go your own way. We no longer have the money to keep you.”

  “I’ll work for free!” Wang Ah-ma stuffed her mouth with the corner of her blouse to avoid crying aloud. “I’ll cost you no money. I have no one else, no place to go. You and the children are my family.”

  The actors from the Wan-Wan Tunes opera troupe came. Many of them, including the nasty turtle-faced lady, had become Christians to Absalom’s credit. “Actors travel,” Absalom once told Papa. “They will be perfect to spread the Gospel.”

  The actors wished Pearl’s family a safe journey and sang their new aria, adapted from the Bible.

  Surely goodness and mercy

  Shall follow you all the days of your life,

  And here we shall remain your faithful servants

  We shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

  Pearl promised to return, but she and I both knew that it was wishful thinking. The Boxers were moving toward the coast and might reach Shanghai soon. America would be the place where Carie and her family would eventually end up.

  Pearl and I struggled to find pleasant farewell words, but it was impossible.

  We bade good-bye and embraced silently.

  The steamboat pulled away from the pier, creating big ripples in the water.

  I waved as my tears ran.

  The ripples went away. The water became calm again.

  I stood on the empty pier and a Tang dynasty poem Pearl used to recite came to mind.

  My friend left the Mansion of Crane for the South where fish would bite

  Hazelike willow down drift, petals scattered in full flight

  Her boat disappears where the waves meet the great river

  The bright moon is over the sky’s dome

  Wild geese fly by mountains and pavilions ancient

  Have you achieved the smile after red sorghum wine sweet

  Wear the blossoming chrysanthemums full in my hair

  Draw the bamboo curtains over the windows and dream for the night

  PART TWO

  CHAPTER 9

  The day I was engaged to be married, I was fourteen. I had no say in the decision. The town’s matchmaker told Papa, “The only medicine that will help your mother regain her health will be news of Willow’s marriage.”

  I wanted to reach Pearl desperately, but our lives had taken separate paths. Pearl had enrolled in a missionary middle school in Shanghai. Her life was a world away from mine.

  “Shanghai is like a foreign country,” Pearl wrote.“The international military forces maintain peace here. My father is waiting for things to calm down in the countryside so that he can return to Chin-kiang. At this moment, he is translating the New Testament. At night, he reads out loud from the original Greek text and Pauline theology. He also chants intonations of Chinese idioms. Mother has fallen ill. She misses her garden in Chin-kiang.”

  Although I wrote back, I was too ashamed to tell my friend that I would soon be married to a man who was twice my age. I felt helpless and close to despair. Pearl’s letters showed me that there were other possibilities in life, if only I could escape. Now I understood why I loved The Butterfly Lovers. The opera allowed my imagination to take flight. In my daydreams, I escaped the life I was living to live the life of a heroine.

  The more dowry that arrived from my future husband, the worse I felt. It didn’t seem to occur to Papa and NaiNai that I deserved better. Papa was angry when I begged to go to school in Shanghai. NaiNai told me that for a small-town girl, “the more she fancies the outside world, the worse her fate will be.”

  * * *

  I had written to tell Pearl that her bungalow home had been set on fire when the Boxers raided the town. To save the church, Papa had replaced the statue of Jesus Christ with the sitting Buddha. Papa told the Boxers that he was a Buddhist and that the church was his temple. To strengthen his lie, Papa dressed like a monk. The converts chanted the Buddhist sutras as the Boxers inspected the property. It was not hard because all the converts were former Buddhists.

  Papa begged Bumpkin Emperor to help protect the church. “The foreign god will return the favor,” he promised. “God will save a seat for you in heaven. You will be reunited with all your dead family members and h
ave an extravagant banquet.”

  Papa’s tricks didn’t last. Once the Boxers discovered that the “monks” were Christian converts, they were slaughtered. A member of the Wan-Wan Tunes opera was dragged out in the middle of their performance and killed in front of Papa’s eyes.

  Carpenter Chan and Lilac were on the Boxers’ list to be beheaded.

  They barely escaped.

  Papa was the last convert to flee the town. On the morning of the Chinese New Year, the Boxers caught him. A public execution was to be held in the town square.

  Papa begged the Boxers to let him live. He admitted that he was a fool.

  The Boxers laughed and said they needed to show the public that the Christian God was a hoax. “If your God is real, call him, because we are going to hang you!”

  Papa fell upon his knees and hailed, “Absalom!”

  Although Papa didn’t believe in God, he believed in Absalom. When a voice answered Papa’s call, everyone was stunned. The voice came from the riverbank. A tall figure jumped off a boat. It was Absalom! His hands were above his head waving a piece of paper. Behind him were Bumpkin Emperor, General Lobster, and General Crab.

  “Old Teacher!” the converts screamed.

  The Boxers carried on. They slipped the noose around Papa’s neck.

  “Stop the execution!” Absalom halted in front of the Boxers. “Here is the copy of Her Majesty Dowager Empress’s decree! Her Majesty has signed a peace treaty with the foreign troops! The eighth item in the treaty says, Foreign missionaries and their converts are to be protected.”

  Five more years would pass before Pearl and I would see each other again. By then I was nineteen and Pearl was seventeen. Our reunion happened soon after our ruler, Dowager Empress Tsu Hsi, died. It was said that she had exhausted herself putting out the wildfire that was the Boxer Rebellion. The new emperor she appointed was only three years old. The nation went into a long period of mourning for the Dowager Empress. Nothing had changed locally, although the country was said to have become a headless dragon.