by Tan, Amy
He stopped. “I think you should remain here until I smooth the way,” he said. “It would not do well to throw this in their face from the start.”
Throw this in their face? Why had he said it that way? “I’m not going to be cowed,” I said. “They can’t ignore me.”
“Please, Lucia, let me do it my way.” He walked toward the first cab without me.
I motioned to the coolie to take my bags to a rickshaw. He looked at Lu Shing with a questioning face, and Lu Shing answered tersely. The man asked another question, and Lu Shing grunted. What was he saying? I understood nothing anymore. I was in a land of secrets.
Damn the bags! I marched without them toward the battalion of cabs and rickshaws. Lu Shing ran toward me and blocked my way. “Lucia, please wait. Let’s not add to a difficult situation.” I was exasperated that Lu Shing was more concerned with his family’s feelings than with mine. I needed to let his family know from the start what kind of woman I was. I had brought with me my American free will and enterprising nature. I was accustomed to dealing with people from all walks of life, the pompous Mr. and Mrs. Minturn, the professors who thought they knew everything.
Lu Shing reached the first cab and began talking to a man seated in the back of the cab. I slowly walked a little way farther down the sidewalk, where I could see a stern-looking man seated in the cab. He was wearing a bowler like Lu Shing’s. As the man spoke, Lu Shing kept his face turned down. I came closer until I was directly across and about twenty-five feet from the curb. I heard Chinese words flowing like water streaming over rocks. The man was Lu Shing’s father. I could see that. He and Lu Shing looked alike, separated only by age. They were both handsome and intelligent-looking, and both wore the identical solemn expression, only the older man’s was rigid.
Lu Shing spoke in a low apologetic voice, and his father’s expression never changed. A pretty girl in the rickshaw just behind the second cab kept her eyes fixed on me. His bride, no doubt. I stared at her until she looked away.
All at once, Lu Shing’s father stood up, shouted what must have been a curse word, and threw his hat in Lu Shing’s face. Lu Shing cupped his eye. His father spit out more words, grating sounds torn from the back of the throat, sharp punctuated orders accompanied by chopping motion of hands. Lu Shing kept his face downward and said nothing. What did this mean? Why did Lu Shing remain motionless, wordless? Perhaps this was how it was done. Refusal through silence. It did not seem likely that the man would calm himself anytime soon. They would leave without us.
Just as I concluded that, Lu Shing turned toward me, walked over, and quickly stuffed money into my hand. He implored me to wait. A tragic expression contorted his face. “I’ll be back as soon as I can. Wait for me here. Be patient, and forgive me for what is happening.”
In the next instant, before I could overcome my shock enough to protest, he climbed into his father’s cab. I watched this, as if in a dream. The driver jiggled the reins, and the cab with Lu Shing moved forward, away from me. The cab behind followed, and all the rickshaw pullers picked up their handles and ran. Lu Shing’s relatives kept their faces turned forward, as if I did not exist. Only the girl stared at me with a scowl. And then they were gone.
I felt faint and sick. I could no longer stand. I spotted a tree farther up the road. How would I ever manage to carry my bags that far? Just as I thought this, I saw the coolie race by me with my bags under his arms. I chased after him, shouting, “Thief! Thief!” I would never catch him. I stopped and was about to fall into a heap when I saw him set my bags under the shade of the tree I had longed to reach. He arranged them to look like a settee then beckoned me to come sit. I walked over slowly, not sure what to make of this. He swept his hand out, as if he were a waiter seating me at a table in a fine establishment.
I noticed after a while that the coolie was still standing close by, staring at me. He wore a questioning look, then tapped his palm and made a motion of rubbing money bills. He wanted me to pay him. I looked at the Chinese money still clutched in my hand. I had no idea what any of it was worth. His fee could not be more than a few cents. But which of these bills was worth more? Which less? The coolie made gestures for eating and drinking, and rubbed his stomach, as if he were starving. Was this a ploy to have me give him more money? He said something incomprehensible and I answered in my own gibberish, “Damn this heat, damn this city! Damn Lu Shing!” I looked for a bill with the lowest number on it. Five. I handed it to him. He grinned. I must have given him a fortune. He raced away. Good riddance. I watched carriages and rickshaws come and go, each of them leaving me in deeper despair.
Ten minutes later, the coolie returned. He had brought a basket. Inside were two brown eggs with crackled shells, three small bananas, and a flask that contained hot tea. He also offered me what I thought was a cane. It turned out to be a parasol. He handed back some coins. This was surprising. Lu Shing must have hired him to take care of me. I examined the basket of food. I was dubious about the cleanliness of these offerings. He pantomimed that all was clean and I had nothing to worry about. I was famished and thirsty. The eggs were odd-tasting but delicious. The bananas were sweet, and the tea was soothing. As I ate, I kept my eyes trained on the road. It was a busy thoroughfare. The servant motioned to me and pointed to the other side of the tree. He indicated I could shout if I needed him. I nodded. He lay on his side, and fell promptly asleep.
I was drawn to sleep as well. But I could not give in to it. Everyone would see my failure: a foolish American girl, alone and in trouble within the first hour of her arrival. I sat erect. I would show I was assured of my place in the world—which for now was under the tree on a thoroughfare, and in a city where I could not speak a word of its language, except the vulgar Chinese words chuh nee bee. I shouted them aloud, and the coolie startled.
I waited for hours on end, sitting on that ridiculous settee. Pride withered, my erect posture melted. My eyelids had a will of their own. I lay down and let sleep arrive and carry me away.
CHAPTER 14
SHANGHAILANDERS
Shanghai
September 1897
Lucia Minturn
In the quietest hour of the night, the coolie was the first to spot Lu Shing coming down the thoroughfare. He roused me and then ran back to the street and crossed his arms back and forth like a drowning man. It had been eighteen hours since Lu Shing had left me at the dock without my knowing whether he would ever return.
Before he could even step out of the rickshaw, my shouts cracked the air: “Damn you! Damn your family!”
He placed me quickly in the rickshaw, and the coolie jumped into another with my belongings. Seeing Lu Shing’s grim expression, I knew we were not headed for his family home. I wept as I accused him of abandoning me like a beggar on the street—and in a strange city where I was unable to speak to anyone. Why didn’t he stand up for me and go with me, instead of leaving me in the hot sun, where I could have roasted to death with a baby in my belly?
I was frightened near to losing my mind. At seventeen I had made a decision with inalterable consequences. I had devastated my mother and father by my hatred of them and their lack of love. I had revealed their vile secrets, the rottenness of their souls, and how ludicrous they were. Were there any sharp truths I had not flung at them? On the boat, I had already sensed the change in myself. I had taken on my parents’ traits even as I condemned them, and I had further altered myself by my cruelty. Had I always had the capacity and desire to destroy another? I no longer had confidence and an independent mind. I was alone and without anyone I could show bluster to. I was dwindling the closer I came to Shanghai, to an uncertain future that depended on one person, who claimed he loved me, but who could not provide assurances of how he would be able to show it once I became the foreigner in his land. I went back and forth, like the pitch of the boat, clinging to the belief that I could conquer whatever obstacles I might encounter. After all, I had conquered the Chinese emperor’s heart. But then I gave in to fea
r that American pluck would be transformed into Chinese Fate. Lu Shing was already different, no longer my Chinese emperor, but a cowed Chinese son.
When Lu Shing apologized, he said the words so quietly, so weakly, they sent me into a fury. How could he protect me? Each time he explained what had happened, I became even more frightened that he had no mind of his own. I did not know this man. In San Francisco, he should have told me he had no feelings for me whatsoever. He should have physically prevented me from getting on the boat. He had warned me, but he had also said he had never loved anyone more, which, I realized now, may have meant little if he had never loved anyone at all. Each meager hope conquered obvious danger. Those warnings belonged to the future, and I lived from one precious moment to another, harvesting love that would sustain me, no matter what arose. And now I was listening to weak apologies and useless explanations about why he had to choose his family over me. He did not understand my fright and what I endured for him. I wanted him to listen to the American women on the boat, saying that white girls had been beaten to death by Chinese mothers-in-law and no one had cared. I wanted him to starve and boil in the hot sun for love of me. I wanted him to destroy his family and his chances of ever going home, just as I had.
“Damn you! Damn your parents!” Out of exhaustion, I finally stopped shouting and simply cried. He lay my head on his shoulder, and I did not pull away from this small amount of comfort.
As we rode through the dark and humid streets, he explained he had spent all these past hours listening to his father shout at him about his responsibilities. His father had slapped him as he enumerated the names of all his ancestors over five hundred years, names that Lu Shing had memorized in his boyhood. His father cited his own position with the Ministry of Foreign Relations, to whom he owed duty and allegiance above family. People would wonder what moral defects he had passed along to an eldest son who would betray his family and destroy their reputation and future honor. His mother deserved a peaceful life in her old age, instead of his ushering her into a grave as fast as possible. She had taken to her bed, complaining of chest pains and a headache. His two younger brothers, the sons of his father’s concubines, rebuked him, something they had never done. They said he would cause people to wonder if they, too, would take up with foreign women and debauchery in all the Western ways. What chance did they have in achieving a good future if he tainted them?
They are an educated family, Lu Shing said, but that did not mean they cast off tradition and filial duty. If he left the house to live with me, he would be disinherited and banished forever from his family, removed from their history, and never mentioned again—not as if he had died, but as if he had never existed. He would never be able to change his mind and return like the prodigal son in the Christian Bible.
“I would risk fortune and being banished into nonexistence for you,” he said. “But I cannot destroy my family.”
“I destroyed mine,” I said. “I have nothing. And now you’re willing to place your family’s reputation over my life?”
“There was never a choice. You can’t understand that unless you have been raised with the weight of five hundred years of your family’s history. It was placed on my back the moment I was born as the eldest son. And I have to carry it forward.”
“You’re a coward. The moment you stepped off the boat you became a superstitious ghost-worshipper. If I had known that was who you were, I would never have come.”
“I told you in San Francisco that my beliefs lay in how I was raised. I can’t change that any more than I can my race or the family I was born to.”
“How could you have expected me to understand what that truly meant? If I had said that I was raised to listen to my parents, to be guided by their advice, would that mean I would follow those expectations?”
“I can help you return home if you can’t bear this.”
“You coward! Is that your answer? I destroyed my mother, my father, and their marriage. I destroyed any chance of ever returning home. They didn’t even come downstairs to say farewell. I’m already dead in their eyes. I have nothing to return to. I have nothing here, and you speak of reputation. You fail to understand how desperate I am. I have no bravery left. I’m falling and don’t even know what abyss I’m falling into, but it’s torment worse than death.” I cried when I ran out of words to say.
The rickshaw took us along the waterfront and then turned onto a smaller street. We turned again and were on a wider street with gated stone mansions. We drove past a park, then more modest houses, English in style and set behind walls.
“Where are you taking me? A home for pregnant girls?”
“The guesthouse owned by a friend, an American. I’ve paid the rent in advance. It’s not ideal, just the best I can do for now. And it’s in the International Settlement, so you’ll be among people who speak English. Rest there, and we can decide later what to do. But let me say now, Lucia, that if you stay, I will not abandon you. But I cannot abandon my family either. Although I don’t know what answer lies in between, I promise to be truthful to you and to them.”
I arrived at the guesthouse an hour before dawn. The gaslights were blazing. An enormous man named Philo Danner greeted us with much enthusiasm. He looked to be fifty. I thought he had sacrificed his sleep to welcome us. But he assured us that he slept during the vampire hours of rest between dawn and noon.
“You must call me Danner,” he said as he led me to the sitting room, “and I will call you Lucia, unless you prefer something else. You can change your name quite easily in Shanghai.”
Lucia was what Lu Shing called me, the name that fated us to be together. “I prefer to be called Lulu,” I said in front of Lu Shing.
Danner was, in a word, flamboyant. He wore a light gold Chinese jacket over loose blue pajama pants. His hair was a dark mass of long angelic ringlets. His eyes were large and rimmed with long lashes. His nose was shapely, the patrician Roman nose of the English. Rolls of doughy flesh draped from his chin to the bottom of his neck. As he walked, his body rolled side to side, and he often ran out of breath and wheezed between words.
He owned this Yankee garden house, he said. It was a three-story building on East Floral Alley, in a good area of the International Settlement. It was built of thick stone walls that kept out the heat in summer and the cold in winter. Every inch of wall in his sitting room, dining room, and halls was covered with framed oil paintings of Western landscapes or scenes of Plains Indians. His tables and mantel held primitive masks, which gave the effect of other tenants staring at me, the interloper. Waist-high stacks of books stood in the middle of the sitting room, like a miniature Stonehenge. Danner maneuvered through the labyrinth with surprising gracefulness. I noticed tassels on the cushions of chairs, and then everywhere—purple, red, navy, and gold ones along the top of the sofa, on the tiebacks of curtains, on the door pulls, along the edges of sofas, at the corners of doorways, on top of the piano, on table scarves, at the corners of mirrors—an infestation.
Danner sat me on the sofa and murmured that he could see in my face that I had suffered a terrible shock. He looked at Lu Shing in an accusatory way. “What have you done to this poor girl?” I liked him immediately. A houseboy brought us tea and butter biscuits. When I quickly finished those, Danner told the houseboy to bring butter, ham, and bread. The food had a calming effect on me, and soon, Danner brought out a pipe.
“Let your troubles vanish into smoke,” he said. “Opium.”
Lu Shing murmured that I should not partake of any, and this caused me to enthusiastically accept Danner’s offer. As Danner talked, the houseboy performed elaborate preparations with a dark brown paste. Danner handed me the pipe and said to inhale just a light puff. It was harsh at first and then my throat was instantly soothed. The taste was like pungent earth, then musk. It quickly changed into a sweet scent. The fragrance was at first like licorice and cloves, then chocolate and roses. Soon it was not simply a scent or a taste but a sensation, a silkiness, which envelo
ped me in its luscious sweetness. I was about to ask Danner a question but instantly forgot what it was because I was now conscious that Danner had the face of a genie. He was playing strange music on the piano. It sounded like heavenly voices.
I noticed Lu Shing sitting on the other side of the sofa, a sad gray figure in a colorful room. I was not angry anymore. He seemed lost. After another puff, I was ecstatic to find that the light from the lamps also made me feel weightless. The sweeping of my hand through the air made a thousand hands. The sound of Lu Shing’s voice calling my name left sparkles before my eyes. His voice was beautiful, musical, so full of love. In looking at him again, he was in a halo of light, which emanated sexual desire. I yearned to have him touch me as he had the first night in the turret when everything surprised me. I had never known it was possible to feel peace and joy so deeply. I recalled memories of happy times as flat and thin, easily torn. In this marvelous smoky cloud of mind, I had no worries, only a glad sense that I would always feel as I did now. I had been awakened!
“Take me to bed,” I said to Lu Shing, and the words floated out one at a time and reached him slowly. Lu Shing looked dazed as my words bounced on his face. Danner laughed and urged Lu Shing to do as I said.
We floated up the stairs. The lamp was lit and the light swirled around the bed like golden beads. Through a glowing doorway, I saw a bathtub that resembled a porcelain soup tureen painted with flowers inside and out. The water was shiny and still. The moment I dipped my hand in and paddled it like an oar, the painted flowers—tiny roses and violets—became real and swirled and scented the air. I quickly freed myself of my itchy clothes and slipped into the cool water, jubilant to feel its silkiness on my naked skin. Lu Shing kneeled behind the bathtub and kissed my neck.
“Lucia, I apologize—”
