Valley of Amazement (9780062107336)

by Tan, Amy

  I was pregnant. Magic Gourd always talked about pregnancy as if it were a sex disease you could catch from men. This was Edward’s baby, my baby, and I would give this baby love, trust, and complete devotion. The moment I thought that, I knew the baby was a girl. I could see her, opening her eyes for the first time. They were green, a shade between my green eyes and Edward’s hazel ones. I imagined her at age four, walking next to me in the park, pointing to birds and flowers, and asking me to name them. And then she was six and reading aloud from a book as I listened. She was twelve, learning history and elocution, and not the tricks of seducing a man. I imagined her at age twenty, my age, with men who tried to win her favor—not to deflower her or bed her in her boudoir—but to ask her to marry. Or maybe she would not marry at twenty or ever. She would run the Ivory family business. She would be Edward’s only heir. This baby girl would have too many choices to count. She would be who I was supposed to have been.

  When I told Magic Gourd I was pregnant, she wailed and ran over to stare at my belly.

  “Ai-ya! Didn’t you stick the little herb pillows inside you? Did you drink the soup? Or did you do this on purpose? Do you know what trouble you’ve given us? How many weeks? Tell me the truth. If it’s less than six, I can still pack the herbs inside you—”

  “I want this baby.”

  “What? You want to look like you’re growing a watermelon in your belly and two winter melons for breasts? You’ll soon be big out to here and even a man with the cock of a horse wouldn’t be able to reach your precious portal. Baby! What man wants to ride a nursemaid with soppy tits squirting all over the place? You’ll lose your suitors, your money, your position in this house, be kicked out, and soon you’ll be a whore—”

  “—lying in a filthy shack with my legs wide open for dogs and rickshaw pullers. You don’t have to tell me anymore.”

  “Good. Now you’ve come to your senses. I’ll call a woman who’s taken care of this same problem for a lot of careless girls. And don’t you listen to those maids from the countryside who tell you to drink tadpole soup. That’s a recipe for twins.”

  “This is Edward’s baby. I want to keep it.”

  “Wah! Edward’s? What difference does that make? You’ve known him for only four months and now you’re willing to ruin your figure and throw away your life for a spoiled American who deserted his wife.

  “How many times have you learned that a man’s loyalty never lasts more than a few seasons? Look at Loyalty. He told you he couldn’t live without you. He said you knew him better than he knew himself. He was your patron for four seasons, then he came by one night here, two nights there, he took another season with you, then it was again one night here, one night there, and now it’s how are you and see you later. You loved him, Violet. It has taken you so long to overcome the wounds. And now you love Edward, who was disloyal to his wife.”

  I regretted telling her that part of Edward’s confession. I only did to let her know he was not a prospect for marriage.

  “How loyal will Edward be in another year—or another five when you have no looks or suitors? And how do you know this is his baby? What if your baby pops out with black hair, crying wah-wah in Chinese? Is your Edward so stupid to think he’s the only one to shoot seeds into you?”

  “No other man could possibly be the father,” I said.

  “Nonsense. You were still seeing Auspicious Liang last month. You were probably too lazy to use the herbal pillows with him, too. Or did you just recite poetry together and look at the moon?”

  “We did other things. There is no possibility that he is the father.”

  “And who will take care of your yowling Yankee bastard? Don’t expect me to be amah to your whim.”

  “I’ll hire an amah. I’ll live with Edward. He asked me long before this happened.”

  “You’ve already told him?”

  “I will tonight.”

  Magic Gourd walked slowly around the room talking to herself: “Ai-ya! Little Violet, why must I do all the worrying? Of course he wants you to live with him. Why pay when he can have you for free? You cannot trust a man to be steadfast. If you depend on one man you can also depend on disaster. Edward’s life is like drifting seaweed. He has no plan. He could drift back to America soon. If you leave this house, Violet, you may not be able to come back once you realize your mistake. You are twenty. At this age, each year goes by more quickly than the last. And the men who would want you when you are older are often the cruel and cheap ones.”

  The maid announced my bathwater was ready. I went behind the screen and quickly immersed myself. I would decide what to do with my life, not Magic Gourd. And I had already decided I was going to have the baby. But as soon as I said that to myself, I was doused with fright. Magic Gourd’s worries appeared before me. Edward said he loved me. But she was right. We had known each other for only four months. He had once been a cruel and careless boy. He might have been born that way and this might come out later. He might have other secrets he had not yet told me. And there was much he did not know about me—the number of men who had visited my bed, and all that I had done with them. We might be in bed one night, and he would sit up and say, “Hey, where did you learn to do that? Who enjoyed these talents you have? What else do you know?” If I told him the truth, he would be shocked and disgusted. He might be so shaken his cruel nature would return. Or maybe he would turn to religion. Many Americans did so when faced with heartache and hardship. Or maybe the prodigal son would return to his family when he was broke. They would lure him with money, and he would make amends with his wife, and this time, she would give him a real baby. He would be with his own people, a mature man in his own society. His happiness would be greater than what it was with me now.

  I pushed those terrible thoughts away. A different future appeared before me. A ship. It would take me across the sea to where I should have gone six years ago. Edward could get me a visa. Fairweather had lied. My birth certificate had probably been at the consulate all along. If we worked fast enough, the baby might even be born in America, and in America, no one would know what I had done in the past—except my mother. She would have no way of knowing I had come. Let her continue to think I died in Shanghai. And where would I live in America? His family would not welcome me.

  Magic Gourd’s smug face sprang to mind. “You see. You do not fit in his world. You never will.” She would not either. What if she spoke without thinking and bragged about how well she had taught me the tricks of a courtesan? I would suffer a permanent fall in society. Edward would defend me at first, but what kind of fortitude did he have? It would be dangerous to bring Magic Gourd with me. In any case, no amount of bribery money could buy the paperwork for her to come to America. And even if I got her a visa, she would never leave Shanghai to live among foreigners. She complained whenever Edward spoke to me in English. It was settled then. She would stay in Shanghai, and I would give her money to help her start a business. Perhaps she could rent a few rooms in a small house and train an appreciative virgin courtesan. I would make sure she was comfortable. Edward would contribute to make that possible, I was sure of it. With guilt dispelled, I could freely imagine life without Magic Gourd’s ceaseless meddlesome ways: her criticism, unwanted advice, and more criticism for not following what she said. I would not have to see her victorious face when the dangers she had warned of came to pass. As terrible as it was to say, it would be a relief to be free of her.

  As if she had heard me, Magic Gourd said: “I know you never like hearing what I have to say.” Her voice sounded tired and sad. “You think that baby growing inside you will fill the emptiness your mother left behind. But listen to me, Violet. You would give that baby your bad fate, and then the two of you would share the same emptiness. I know you do not want to hear that. But I am only being honest, and who else would tell you the truth?”

  I did not answer.

  “If you decide to have the baby and live with Edward, I will say nothing more. I will not be
happy for you, but I will always be here to help you when you realize you’re in trouble, unless I have already perished on the streets.”

  THE NEXT MORNING, I told Edward in a straightforward manner that I was pregnant. “This isn’t your burden,” I said, “and there is nothing you must decide, because I have already decided.”

  “What did you decide?”

  “I am keeping the baby and will raise it myself.”

  I watched his face change from shock to jubilance. “Violet, you have no idea how happy you’ve made me. If I could jump to the moon to show you, I would.” He enclosed me in his arms and rocked me. “A beautiful innocent baby we created out of love. She’s part of us, the best part—which means she is more you than I. But I’ll claim what I can, a thumb, a toe, a smile …”

  He said she. “How do you know it’s a girl?”

  He paused, clearly surprised by his slip of the tongue. “I instantly saw her in my mind as you … It must be because I was wishing today that we could start our lives from the beginning. I was wishing that I had known you all your life and all of mine.”

  Who would Edward have become if he had not been cruel when he was a boy? He would not have met me in China. He would have remained at his family home, married a woman he loved, had a baby with his wife, and would never have left them. He would have had no need for additional companionship. He would not have come to the House of Vermillion and plunked down twenty silver dollars on the table. I never would have met him. But we did. It was our fate and our natures, flawed and wounded, that brought us together.

  Edward took my hands and kissed them. “Violet, I know you didn’t intend to become pregnant. I’m deeply grateful that you’ve decided to keep the baby. We’ll start afresh, without the old sadness. She’ll be our future. And we’ll love our baby completely and perhaps we’ll be able to love each other just as fully. Can we live together, the three of us? Can you bear it? I know there is nothing I can do to prove without a doubt that you can trust me. But if you give me a chance, I would prove it to you every day.”

  The next afternoon, Edward returned with good news. He had told his host, Mr. Shing, he would be departing soon. “I said we were getting married. It’s not a lie. I feel that there is more truth to our unity than there ever was with my legal wife. No one in Shanghai would ever know I had been married before. And I do plan to press more strongly for a divorce. In the meantime, you are my Mrs. Ivory and we will have a wonderful place for raising our child. Mr. Shing has kindly offered his own house—not the guesthouse but the mansion. I had wanted only his advice on where to look for a suitable house to rent. He nearly wrestled me to the ground, insisting I move into his house. He said he was leaving for Hong Kong soon and would be gone for at least two years. If we want to continue to live in his house when he returns, he will take the guesthouse, which he prefers anyway. The main house, he says, is too big for a man who spends only a few weeks a year in Shanghai.”

  I felt uneasy. A favor this generous was not to be trusted. Mr. Shing might be a gangster who would extract a debt from Edward.

  “Does Mr. Shing know who you’re marrying? Is he aware that I’m a courtesan.”

  “I told him about you early on, right after our meeting that went awry. I had told him at the time that you were Eurasian but could pass as an Italian countess. Mr. Shing found it interesting that I had fallen in love with a courtesan. He said it was not hard to believe, since courtesans tend to be far more interesting than most women who have led sheltered lives and have done only what good society has told them to do. He asked all sorts of questions about you—all of them proper. Your name, your age, the usual facts. And it turns out he has heard of your mother. He acknowledged she was well known but he said he had not been aware of what had happened to her daughter.”

  Edward went on bended knee. “Now that we have a threshold over which I can carry you, I would like you to make me an honorable man.” He took from his pocket a ring. It was a large oval diamond surrounded by smaller ones. “Violet,” he began, then broke down and wept.

  I was ashamed I had ever doubted Edward. I was not accustomed to the magnitude of such love. I had been influenced by Magic Gourd to disbelieve anything a man might say that moved my heart.

  Just then Magic Gourd walked into the room. “What’s going on here?”

  “Edward has asked me to live with him,” I said. “And he’s given me a ring.” I held it up. The size of the diamond spoke to its significance.

  Her face turned rigid. “I’m so happy you showed me I am wrong.” She left the room.

  A half hour later, she returned, her eyes red and her jaw stiff. It was the most emotion I had ever seen her express, and I knew that had she been able to hold it back, she would have. She laid out on the bed the jewelry she had put in safekeeping for me. Next, she tossed onto the divan the gifts I had given her over the years: the jacket, the hat, the shoes, the necklace, the bracelet, the mirror, the valise with my mother’s dress, and the two paintings. “Look them over and tell me if everything is there. I don’t want you to later accuse me of stealing from you.”

  “Stop talking nonsense,” I said.

  “Soon you won’t have to hear my nonsense.”

  “What is going on?” Edward asked. “Why is she angry? I thought she’d be pleased.”

  I answered in English. “She’s accused me of abandoning her.”

  “Well, that is easy to remedy. The house is certainly big enough. She can have a whole wing to herself, if she wants.”

  I was stunned. I had no time to tell Edward what I had planned to do for Magic Gourd. She was standing in front of us. She would detect what I was saying and Edward’s puzzlement that I would turn down his offer. On the other hand, I should translate what Edward said. She had once said she would refuse to live with a foreigner.

  “He has empty rooms?” Magic Gourd said. “You have an empty heart. He offered to have me live with you. I could see your sneaky face, trying to think how you could be rid of me. Well, don’t worry. I wouldn’t live with two foreigners, even if they begged me.”

  If I did not beg, that would have settled it. And it would be her decision, and I would not feel guilty about it. Edward had offered. I had translated. But an awful feeling washed over me. If I did not ask, it would be like killing her. I owed her a debt of gratitude. More than gratitude, much more.

  I could finally see what had always been there. She had been more than an attendant, more than a friend, more than a sister. She had been a mother to me. She had worried, sought to protect me from danger, guided me toward the best. She had looked out for my future, assessed the worthiness of everyone to be in my life. And in that way, she had taken me as her purpose in life, the one who gave her meaning. I had had constant love all along. And in recognizing that, I felt moved to tears.

  “How could you step out of my life?” I told her. “If you don’t join me, I will be lost. No one would worry about me as much as you. No one knows me better, knows my past and what this new life means. I should have told you a long time ago.” I became teary-eyed. She kept her lips sealed, but her jaw was trembling. “You are the only loyal person in my life, the only one I can trust.”

  Tears fell from her eyes. “Now you know. I was always the only one.”

  “We love each other,” I said with a light laugh. “In spite of all the trouble I’ve given you, you stayed with me. So it must be that you loved me like a mother.”

  “Wah! Mother? I’m not old enough to be your mother.” She was crying and laughing. I could tell by her strong protests that this was exactly what she had wanted me to realize and what she had wanted to hear. “I’m only twelve years older. How could I be your mother? Maybe you could say I was like an older sister.”

  She had made herself even younger than the last time she lied about her age. “You have been like a mother to me,” I repeated.

  “That can’t be. No, no, I’m too young.”

  I had to repeat it a third and final time, so
that she would finally accept this and not doubt I was being genuine. “No one could have loved me more, except a mother.”

  “Not even Edward?”

  “No one. Only a mother, only you.”

  MAGIC GOURD AND I had to quickly decide which of our belongings to take and which to part with. We sold the furniture, including the pieces Loyalty gave me for my defloration. Magic Gourd kept a few knickknacks. The costumes we loved most could never be worn anywhere other than a courtesan house. I had to sort them into ones that were more or less valuable than others. At first it was simple to decide. I set aside the costumes with stains and rips. I gave those to the maids to sew and clean as best they could. Magic Gourd took those to the pawnshop, but we were offered a ridiculously low amount. We had no time to go back and forth over the week to bargain. So we gave them to the maids who had repaired them. I would have thought they would be grateful beyond tears, but they accepted the clothes with a look of disappointment. I assured them that they would also receive the customary tip, after which they admired the clothes and praised me for being more generous than other courtesans who also left to live as concubines of rich husbands.

  I gave a very nice winter costume to Shining. It was well made, of good silk, and had an exaggerated sleeve shape that resembled a lily. I gave another to Serene. It was an excursion costume for carriage rides, a showy one, with a high-neck fur collar, and it was beautiful, all but the color, an odd shade of mauve that did not suit my complexion. It was supposed to be the color of oxblood, but which I had come to feel was closer to the tinge of a bleeding pig. Whenever I wore it, I had bad luck with suitors who did not pay or with slights by Loyalty. But the color enhanced Serene’s pale skin, and thus it would likely bring her better luck. She was overcome with emotion when I gave her the costume. She told me I was a good person—and with genuine feeling, I believed.