The Jade Widow

by Deborah O'Brien

  ‘Good morning, ladies. Wid ye care for a wee cup of tea or wid ye prefer the full luncheon?’

  Amy was taken aback. How had a Chinaman acquired a Caledonian accent? Then again, Charles had always sounded as though he had just come down from Oxford. It had been the influence of Captain Miller, the officer who had served under Nelson at Trafalgar. Mr Tart must have learnt English from a Scotsman.

  ‘We would like to have lunch, please, sir.’

  ‘Then kindly follow me and I shall show ye to yer table.’

  ‘What an enchanting man,’ Aunt Molly whispered as he led them across the crowded room.

  ‘Here we are, ladies,’ he said, handing them a menu in an embossed leather cover. ‘I shall send a waitress to take yer order.’

  ‘Before you go, sir,’ said Amy, ‘I was wondering about your Scots accent. You see, I am a Scot myself.’

  He smiled, showing perfect white teeth. ‘I worked for a Scottish shopkeeper by the name of Mr Forsyth in a country town called Braidwood. That’s why I sound as I do. In point of fact, I hail from Kwangtung in China.’

  ‘So did my late husband. His mother lives there still.’

  ‘My own mother does too.’

  ‘Really? What a small world.’

  ‘It is indeed, Mrs . . .’

  ‘Chen.’

  ‘I do apologise. Mrs Chen. I didna introduce maself. I am Mei Quong Tart. People call me Mr Tart.’

  Although Amy knew exactly who he was, she said, ‘It is a pleasure to meet you, Mr Tart. May I introduce my aunt, Mrs Mackenzie?’

  Mr Tart bowed towards Aunt Molly as if she were the Queen. ‘Dear ladies, I have enjoyed our wee chat, but I must away now to greet the other customers. The waitress will be here in a jiffy. I trust ye will both enjoy yer meal.’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Tart,’ they said in unison.

  As he took his leave, Aunt Molly whispered, ‘He’s so much like Charles.’

  ‘Mmm,’ said Amy.

  They ordered jasmine tea and cucumber sandwiches from one of a smartly dressed team of waitresses.

  ‘It won’t be long before you will be organising your own staff,’ said Aunt Molly. ‘Do you have an opening date?’

  ‘Not yet,’ said Amy, staring at the contents of her teacup as if the leaves could predict the future.

  ‘Mr Tart might be able to give you some advice on the business side of things. He seems to be running his own establishment most efficiently. Are you planning a big opening ceremony?’

  ‘It’s too soon to think about that, Aunt Molly.’ She knew she should be approaching her aunt about a loan, but now that the moment had come, she couldn’t bring herself to do it.

  ‘The construction is progressing smoothly, isn’t it?’ Aunt Molly asked.

  ‘Of course,’ Amy lied.

  After lunch Amy paid the bill before Aunt Molly could wrest it from her. They saw Mr Tart briefly as they were leaving.

  ‘I trust we shall see ye here again,’ he said.

  ‘The next time I’m in Sydney,’ said Amy.

  ‘Guid. I shall look forward to continuing our conversation.’

  When Amy arrived home on Saturday afternoon, the house was empty. Charlie had begged to be allowed to stay another night at the Millers’ and Amy had given in. Eliza would be bringing him back after church. It was so quiet without Charlie that Amy began to question her decision to send him away. But she couldn’t keep him forever – she accepted that now. At least, her head had accepted the inevitability; her heart lagged a little behind.

  She made herself a cup of Lapsang Souchong and took it into the parlour, which looked much as it had when Charles was alive, save for the addition of a few more silk cushions and a collection of silhouettes and sepia photographs hanging on the wall. Amy loved that room. It was a reflection of Charles and his tastes – a combination of the Western and the Oriental. One might have expected it to be a mishmash, a clash of two worlds – Chinese scrolls and Victorian landscapes, stiff-backed furniture and bright brocade antimacassars, export porcelain and Staffordshire figures. Yet strangely the room was imbued with such a sense of repose she often went there to sit in Charles’s armchair and work through a problem.

  Today it was her ‘pecuniary situation’, as Doctor Ross had so aptly put it. She sipped her tea and tried to come up with a solution, other than doing away with the architectural features she most wanted for her hotel. After a while, her attention drifted to the china cabinet in the corner of the room, its doors decorated with a fretwork pattern of faux bamboo known as Chinese Chippendale. On its shelves a collection of cloisonné vases and bowls stood side by side with jade statues and porcelain figures. Since Charles’s death, there had been only one acquisition, an intricately shaped tree – literally a jade tree – a gift from Jimmy and May after they had discovered they were expecting a baby. Amy’s flowering jade plants had brought them good fortune, they’d told her. Although she had secretly smiled at the notion, she also understood the spiritual significance of jade to Chinese people and didn’t scoff at the superstition. Besides, if the tree had brought luck to Jimmy and May, who were only visitors to the house, what might it impart to Amy, who actually lived there? A resolution to her financial problems perhaps? After all, jade plants were also known as money trees.

  The other significant piece of jade in the collection took the form of a figurine perched on a rosewood stand, a lady in a long dress, arranged in folds, with her hair pulled into a bun. Amy had been entranced by the statue on one of her early visits to the emporium. There had even been a time when she had fantasised about being a jade lady, living on Mr Chen’s shelf. After they were married, she had confided in Charles about her daydream. That very night he had arrived home with a parcel wrapped in brown paper. After she removed the wrapping, Amy had exclaimed with joy at the sight of the figurine. They’d placed it in the china cabinet between Washington and Nelson. ‘The jade bride’, Charles had dubbed it.

  Now, it was the jade widow.

  If Amy half-closed her eyes and squinted at the jade lady, the figurine could easily have been wearing one of those dresses with a draped overskirt, which were so fashionable back in the eighteen-seventies. Amy herself had owned several of them. Even the upswept hairstyle, tied with a ribbon, was similar to the way Amy wore her hair. And the apple-green colour of the gown was one of the most popular of the era.

  She went over to the cabinet, opened the glass door and removed the figurine. The surface was smooth and cold as silk. She took it to the oil lamp and held it to the light. It was so transparent that when she put her finger behind it, she could see its shape right through the jade. ‘Translucent’ was the word Charles had used to describe it. ‘Like your skin,’ he’d said. People often commented on Amy’s complexion, so pale and delicate that the purple veins were faintly visible below the surface. She herself had longed to have skin like Charles’s, well suited to the Australian climate, with the sheen and colour of bronze.

  ‘Jade might look fragile,’ he had told her, ‘but in truth it is durable and strong. Much harder, for example, than gold. It cannot be carved or chiselled. It must be patiently worn away using special tools and abrasive pastes. Like the sea eroding a rock face, the process takes an exceedingly long time. In China we call jade the stone of heaven because it has both earthly and celestial attributes.’

  Giving the figurine a last gentle caress, Amy returned it to its place between the two military gentlemen. If only she were as strong and durable as the jade lady, anything would be possible.

  X

  ELIZA

  Monday 11th May, 1885

  When the postmaster handed Eliza a bag of mail for Millerbrooke, she riffled through it searching for a letter from Daniel. After weeks without a word, she wasn’t really expecting to find anything and was surprised to see an envelope addressed to ‘Mr John Miller Esquire and Family’ in Daniel’s familiar back-slanted writing. His governess had never been able to cure him of it, despite her insistence he use a slope
card beneath every page.

  Eliza was tempted to open the letter on the spot. After all, Daniel had included her in the salutation on the envelope, if not by name. But she wasn’t sure how she was going to react to reading it. After the episode in Martin Burns’s office, she was afraid she might burst into tears in front of the postmaster. Then again, she was still furious with Daniel and if there were to be tears, they would be as much from anger as from missing him. Would there be a letter for Nancy in today’s post? Possibly not. His one night of congress with her would likely be a dim memory now, if he remembered it at all. Suddenly, an awful thought struck her. How would they explain their own letter from Daniel if Nancy had received nothing whatsoever?

  Eliza went to the horse paddock, collected Neddy and rode home, allowing him to trot rather than canter because he was no longer a young horse. In fact, he would soon be fifteen; although he was still able to pull a carriage on occasion, she was careful not to overload it or go too fast. They crossed the creek, which wound its way from its source in the hills right past her house and down through the town, before it joined into the main river. After the bridge she stopped to allow Neddy to drink the flowing water. In her saddlebag the letter from Daniel was daring her to open it. She dismounted, removed the envelope and went down to the edge of the creek where she found a seat on a rock. Meanwhile, Neddy had sated his thirst and was happily nibbling at the lush grass growing along the bank.

  Mindful that her mother would no doubt require the envelope intact for inclusion in her scrapbook, Eliza was careful not to rip it open. Instead, she slit the top with her penknife. There were two leaves of paper inside.

  Nile Field Force

  NSW Contingent

  Suakin

  10th March, 1885

  Dearest Papa and Mama, Joseph, Eliza and James,

  I trust this letter finds you all well. I am sorry that my first correspondence was so brief. We had only just returned from the assault on Tamai and I was anxious to dash off a note to you before I went to sleep.

  Firstly, you can rest assured that I continue to be in good health despite the ferocious heat, which has struck down our valiant horses with sunstroke and caused a few cases of dysentery and fever among the men. I promise I will never complain about an Australian summer again.

  It has been a bitter struggle in the face of an enemy who knows these deserts better than anyone, is well accustomed to the sandstorms and fierce sun and is equipped with rifles captured from the Egyptian army. Since the fall of Khartoum they have even acquired an arsenal within the city where they continue to make bullets and cartridges. Therefore there is no shortage of ammunition on their part. However, in recent days they seem to have lost their fervour and disappeared into the hills, emerging only for the occasional skirmish. We pray that it will soon be over.

  In the meantime, the British are sending us to protect the railway line being laid across the desert from Suakin to Berber. I suspect they have no idea what to do with us now that things have gone quiet, except for some sporadic gunfire at night.

  Scuttlebutt is always circulating around the camp regarding where we will be sent next. Some say we will be shipped off to Gibraltar where we would serve as a garrison force. Others speak of the Anglo-Russian difficulty and suggest we may be deployed to the Afghan frontier. Most of all, we want to come home.

  Please pass on my fondest regards to Amy and Charlie. I have written to them in a separate letter. As for your dear selves, kindly accept my loving and respectful wishes.

  Ever your loving son, brother and uncle,

  Daniel

  Thank goodness I am on my own, thought Eliza, as she wiped away the tears. It was difficult to remain angry with Daniel when he sounded so homesick. After all, she herself had experienced the same affliction. Furthermore, she was relieved that she could supply an excuse to Nancy in the event of her not receiving a missive from Daniel. If his first letter to the family had gone astray or was still to arrive, Eliza could hint that the same thing had happened to Nancy’s. Sometimes a falsehood was kinder than the truth, she thought to herself, as she stared absently at the creek, its waters so clear that she could see the bed of pebbles lying a couple of feet below the surface. All of a sudden there was a plop. At first she thought it might be a fish, but then she recognised the concentric circle of ripples that could indicate only one creature – a platypus. She watched it duck-diving playfully, oblivious to her presence. There was something particularly appealing about the animal. And not just because it was a hodgepodge of so many other creatures. What she liked most was its independence. Apart from the mating season, she had never seen two platypuses in the one stretch of the creek. For most of the year the platypus seemed perfectly happy to lead its own life. As if it had read her thoughts, it made a final dive and disappeared, leaving only a trio of bubbles to prove it had been there in the first place.

  As soon as she arrived home, Eliza presented her parents with Daniel’s letter and watched their joyful reaction. Afterwards she went upstairs to her room, sat down at her desk and began composing a letter to Rose Scott. With everything that had happened in recent months – Daniel going off to war, the arrival of Martin Burns and the news about Nancy – Eliza had become lax in her correspondence with Rose, the girl from Singleton, who was making a name for herself as a gentle but persuasive advocate for social reform. Today Eliza had a matter she wished to raise with her pen friend – the plight of unwed mothers. Nancy’s case was the exception, of course. Her future was assured. She had fallen in love with the son of fair-minded John Miller. She had the Miller family to support her, and once the war was over, she would be Daniel’s bride. In the event that he was back by August or September, a carefully draped cloak might still conceal Nancy’s rounded belly as she walked down the aisle, preceded by her bridesmaids. Any later, and the fact that she was already pregnant would be impossible to disguise. There would be Millbrookers, such as Matthew Duncan, who would condemn her for her sins, though they wouldn’t necessarily blame the father. ‘After all,’ they would say, ‘men will be men. And Captain Miller is Millbrooke’s very own war hero.’

  At the last moment Eliza decided to canvass her pen friend’s opinion about an idea which had been forming in her mind over the months since her return from the Continent. It sounded innocent enough – an eclectic society for Millbrooke’s ladies, but Rose would understand that it was really a code name for a women’s suffrage league. There was vehement opposition to women having equal rights with men. That was one reason why the titles of such organisations had to sound as though they were a quilting bee or a literary society.

  Whatever the name, it would only be by banding together that progress would be made. During the Victorian election a carriage full of ladies had turned up at a polling booth, claiming they were entitled to vote, owing to a phrase within the legislation which referred to eligible voters as ‘all persons’ instead of ‘men’. The wording was an oversight, of course. The legislators had never intended to include everyone, especially not the creatures they considered to be inferior and weak-minded. The ladies had swooped on the unexpected opportunity. In the process, they had become the first women in the colonies to vote in an election.

  The following year, Victoria’s male legislators closed the loophole.

  Only a week after they received Daniel’s letter, Joseph brought momentous news.

  ‘It’s over!’ he shouted as he strode inside the house with the paper.

  ‘For heaven’s sake, what is all that racket?’ called John Miller from his study.

  Eliza came bounding down the stairs from her bedroom where she had been reading the latest copy of The Lancet.

  ‘The campaign is over!’ said Joseph. ‘They’re coming home!’

  Their father emerged from the study and leaned against the blackwood architrave for support. After a while he whispered, ‘Thank God.’

  ‘Where’s Mama?’ asked Joseph. ‘We must tell her.’

  ‘She is upstairs,
taking a nap, but no doubt your shouting will have woken her.’ Though the words sounded gruff, he had a smile on his face.

  Joseph opened the newspaper to the middle section, which was home to the news stories. ‘Fresh off the Sydney train and direct from London via the submarine cable. Look at the headline, Papa,’ he urged.

  Their father peered at the words through his wire-rimmed glasses.

  Embarkation of N.S.W. Contingent from Suakin

  He took off his spectacles and wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. ‘The Good Lord has answered our prayers. I can’t believe it has happened so soon. And not a single one of our men killed in action.’

  ‘Does the paper give the date of their return?’ asked Eliza.

  ‘The middle of June,’ replied Joseph.

  ‘That’s only a month away. Mama will be so pleased. She’ll have a July wedding organised before we know it.’

  ‘Do you want to hear what Lord Wolseley said when he addressed the contingent before they embarked?’ asked Joseph.

  ‘Of course,’ said John.

  As Joseph began reading aloud from the newspaper, Eliza pretended to yawn.

  ‘Australia, in putting such a fine body of troops in the field, is a warning to any quarrelsome nation that they will have to fight not only Great Britain and Ireland but also England’s most distant colonies.’

  ‘Piffle!’ exclaimed Eliza almost before he had finished the extract.

  ‘Eliza!’ her father admonished. ‘Ladies should never speak in such a manner. Thank goodness your mother didn’t hear you using a curse word.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Papa. It’s just that Britain interferes all over the world in the name of her Empire, and from now on she will expect us to come and help mop up the problems that she has created. Who knows where the next conflict will be? Fighting the Russians on the Afghan frontier or the Boers in the Transvaal? They are Britain’s troubles, not ours.’