The Concubine's Daughter

by null

  The Fish struggled to keep her words steady and sure, but all the strength within her could not hold back her tears.

  “I promise this child will learn the ways of a scholar. She will be loved and respected, and I will move heaven and earth to keep her safe.”

  Li squeezed her hand. “Do not cry for me, dear Auntie. This was written on the talisman of the rainbird; you were told of it but dared not say. I think I always knew that my place on the mountaintop would be brief.”

  She raised a hand, drawing on the last of her strength. “On the dresser, in the box of shells, there are precious things. Most precious are my diary and the journal of Pai-Ling. In their pages are the thousand pieces of gold as I have found them. It will tell her of my journey and perhaps guide her steps.” With a trembling hand, Li removed the golden guinea from her neck.

  “Give her this, the first of her thousand pieces. Tell her I shall be with her always; she only has to close her eyes and call my name. There are jewels and other things that are precious to me. Take them and give them to her when she has lived for ten years, and when she is ready, take her to her father’s house.”

  The sedative had dulled the suffering that engulfed her so completely, yet she found a window in her mind still open, a light that led her through all pain toward an August moon. “You must go now, in the sampan at the jetty. Take her before Master Ben returns.”

  Li entered a domain without pain or fear or sorrow, in which she heard the muffled cry of her child and, moments later, the closing of the door. Gathering the last of her strength, she rose from the bed as in the most mysterious of dreams. A bloodred curtain slowly ascended; in a trance she passed out onto the marble terrace, cool beneath her feet. The moon blazed like a beacon, suddenly draped in a fleece of cloud fringed with silver. She moved toward the balustrade, aware that even at night the scent of chrysanthemums and marigolds lay heavy on the air. The sea winds struck like fire upon the mask that was her face.

  A voice broke through her reverie, real and vicious as a lash. “The sea is cold, little Miss Li; it conquers any fire. It opens its arms to welcome you.” Beside her, no more than a step away, the dark shape of Ah-Ho loomed against the sky.

  The patch of cloud thinned enough to show the glitter of jewels as she slowly trickled a string of sapphires from one hand to the other. “I did not think old dog bones deserved such a rich reward for her treachery.” She held up the necklace in front of Li, dangling it for a moment like a plaything. Even through her haze Li could glimpse the unmistakable flash of canary yellow. Then the thin cloud cover drifted like a sail across the beaming face of the moon, and again Ah-Ho was cloaked in shadow.

  “Do not worry, dog bones has not been harmed, nor your demon offspring. To take their unworthy lives would see revenge too quickly ended. The fool Di-Fo-Lo you have so enchanted will be allowed to grieve and continue with his tortured life. The box made of shells was too heavy for such hands as hers, so I have lightened her load and taken these … to remind me of the slut that was dragged from the riverbed and thought herself a scholar.”

  From the darkness, Ah-Ho’s breath was hot upon Li’s face. “Because of you, the New Year will not be a fortunate one for me,” she crooned. “Because of you, the great Di-Fo-Lo will never know the joss of his brat; he will spend his life in search of it or the place that hides its bones. Peace will never again walk beside him, nor happiness reside in his broken heart. You alone have brought this curse upon him. Now the choice is yours: Wait for him and let him care for what is left of you for the rest of his miserable life”—the amah chuckled with the mirth of darkest evil—“or give him freedom at least from that.”

  The layers of cloud drifted apart like silk banners. Beneath them she saw the tall masts and gleaming hull of the Golden Sky against the bluest of blue skies. She saw Ben tossing back his hair and blowing like a porpoise as she climbed upon the rail poised above a crystal sea of turquoise. The sound of Wang’s flute mingled with the chortling of a thrush, as Ben’s voice came to her on an offshore breeze: “Don’t be afraid, Lee Sheeah; I am here to catch you. I will teach you to swim like a mermaid.”

  The cloud passed, the terrace illumined by a flood of brightness. Ah-Ho was gone, or perhaps had never been there. Ben was calling, beckoning her. “Dive, Lee Sheeah—you can do it. I am here beside you.”

  The waters claimed her and took away her pain. She plunged through dancing halls of moonlight, all movement stopped and all sound forever ceased, as she drifted down on a chain of silver bubbles. Li-Xia was in the ginger field, where butterflies lifted like petals at her passing, wading through white blossoms, to where Pai-Ling waited with wide-open arms to swing her high against a sky of duck-egg blue.

  Indie Da Silva was half conscious when Ben arrived at the Double Dragon shipyard. The knife wound in his side was not serious, but had bled profusely. A single blow from behind had robbed his limbs of all movement. “The fist that did this knew exactly what it was doing and why.” Indie tried to grin, fumbling for a cheroot. “It was the hand of a Boxer.” He choked on the rum Ben held to his lips, grimacing through his pain as he lit the chewed nub of a Burmese cheroot, sucking smoke deep into his lungs.

  “Someone paid the gang to set this fire. They knifed the gatekeeper and took me by surprise.” He winced with pain. “I saw the face of that cocky little bastard Ah-Geet among them. I’m sorry, Ben; I should have dealt with this alone.”

  Ben drove him to the hospital at a speed that raised curses and horn blasts from those he passed. Sudden fear had sprung within him like a lighted flame.

  The fire had been started with a drum of spilled tar, the same thing that had all but burned Chiang-Wah alive. Was it coincidence, or did it have the touch of ritual about it?

  The sabotage attempt had been easily contained, with little serious damage and nothing stolen. This was not like them… .

  Kidnap—the word suddenly screamed aloud in his mind. Could this have been a distraction to get him away from Repulse Bay? The word rang in his ears like the echo of a triad gong struck by the Incense Master to seal a prophecy. Kidnap. Kidnap. Kidnap . . .

  He sped back to the yard to call the Villa Formosa, letting the telephone ring as his thoughts kept racing. It could take two hours to return to Hong Kong. The pinnace was capable of eighteen knots with throttles open. His mind searched frantically for a faster way. There was none.

  He leaped aboard and took the wheel as the coxwain cast off the lines. He opened up both engines and kept the throttles wide, the pinnace’s bows surging forward with a throaty roar. When the engineer poked his head from the hatchway to warn him of the pressure such high speed was creating, Ben waved him back.

  He could not shake his sense of dread. He prayed it would turn out to be a simple robbery; they could empty the house for all he cared, burn it to the ground, so long as Li was safe. Ransom: the word was a comfort. He would pay anything to get her back; he’d leave Hong Kong and sail with her around the world on Golden Sky.

  He had turned on the powerful searchlights that warned other craft to give way. Through the spray-flecked windows of the wheel house, the face of Li-Xia seemed to rise from the sheets of spume flung across the bows.

  The sun had hauled well clear of the sea when Ben leaped the fast-closing gap from the deck to the jetty and bounded up the steep stone steps that led to the gardens of the Villa Formosa. He prayed he would find her in the Pavilion of Joyful Moments, seated with the Fish over a pot of mimosa tea, with Yin and Yang disturbed from their cushions to growl at the disturbance. His stomach lurched as he found the pavilion empty, its table bare.

  It was early, he told himself, vaulting the balustrade, bursting through the French doors of her bedroom; she was sleeping late. It was empty, the bedclothes rumpled. Yin and Yang were nowhere to be seen, the snuffling and yapping that greeted every visitor eerily absent. He rushed from room to room, bellowing for the Fish, his heart thumping as he found her room deserted. The study too was empty, deathly silen
t but for the steady ticking of the clock. It chimed the hour of six, bringing a fresh wave of horror; the balcony doors were ajar, the security system linked to the gate house switched off.

  She must be walking. The gardens … of course, this was the time for her stroll. He would find her feeding the fan tailed fish from the middle of a hidden bridge, the dogs chasing dragonflies. Ah-Kin came running from his cottage as Ben called Li’s name, striding from one solitary haven to another to find only fragrant emptiness and the careless chatter of moving waters. Her name echoed in every hidden corner of the grounds, over the five-bar gate and through the birch wood.

  “Missy Li has not been to the gardens this morning. I fed the fish without her.”

  Ah-Kin was frightened by the wild-eyed look on the master’s face, the frantic urgency in his voice. The gardener’s wife and son appeared at the compound gate, confused by such uncommon disruption of peace and quietude. Ah-Kin assured him they had neither seen nor heard anything to concern them. The Sikh guards heard his calling and arrived quickly with their excited dogs. There was no disturbance during the night, the gatekeeper assured Ben; the walls were patrolled without incident; the dogs had been quiet. Ben dismissed them with orders to search the grounds, and told Ah-Kin and his son to cover every inch of the estate.

  A fresh hope jolted his racing mind; he almost cursed himself for allowing his imagination to play such tricks. Of course, of course—the Temple of Pai-Ling. This was the time of prayer; she had walked the gardens and gathered the night’s crop of fallen frangipani for the altar. Crossing the ocean terrace, he wanted to call her name, but checked his haste for an instant when he saw the temple doors ajar.

  There was something about the little shrine that had always been off-limits to him. Although she had invited him inside to witness the lighting of joss sticks, the burning of paper prayers and offerings at the feet of Kuan-Yin, he had felt himself to be an intruder. He realized there was not enough Chinese in him to share such a sacred place with her.

  He approached silently, afraid to speak her name, merely praying to see her kneeling before the goddess, sticks of smoking incense in her hand. He would never leave her side again. A shaft of daylight lay across the prayer mat, bathing the goddess in its beam.

  He softly called Li’s name, but met only silence. In the strengthening light, Kuan-Yin was ablaze with glory, the bloodied snow-white fur of Yin and Yang hanging before her on their bright red leads. On the floor, in trampled, scattered shards, were the faded faces and forgotten names that Li had treasured, and the broken pieces of a laughing Buddha. The unmistakable stench of human excrement and urine left no air to breathe.

  The body of Li-Xia Devereaux was pulled from the waters by Hokklo fishermen returning home at daybreak with their catch. They laid her on the jetty and fled when they saw Di-Fo-Lo taking the narrow steps of rock as though he could fly. They looked at each other in fear; they had no wish to witness the cries of a mad gwai-lo who perhaps would blame them for the horror they had dredged from their fishing spot close to the rocks.

  Ben had refused help in carrying Li’s body to her room, ordering Ah-Kin and the guards to keep to their places and let no one into the grounds. When he had laid her gently on the rumpled bed, her body still well covered, Ben felt reason slipping from his grasp. The fire in his gut turned to the solid stone of despair, dragging him into a pit of howling darkness that had no bottom and no light. He lurched, on legs that threatened to fail him, into the study to find brandy. In the center of the fir desk, a page of paper was neatly laid before his chair. With a sinking heart, he recognized her writing, though the scrawl was barely readable.

  Forgive me for what I have to do, but it is written in the moon. Our daughter is in the hands of one we trust before all others. Do not search for her; she has gone to a place where she will grow in peace beyond the evil that stalks our happiness.

  You could have done nothing to prevent this; it was ordained by powers far greater than ours. When she is grown and the danger passed, she will find you if this is also written.

  Thank you, my young lord, for teaching me the meaning of love. To know it for a golden moment is enough, but you gave me riches beyond my dreams.

  —Lee Sheeah

  Ah-Kin looked anxiously at his wife and son as a bellow of despair came from the house: “My child. Where is my child?” The agony of Di-Fo-Lo’s cry rent the serenity of the Ti-Yuan gardens, echoing through the moon gates and the empty perfumed screens of the pavilion. It carried out to sea, causing fishermen to shake their heads. Raising a hand to keep his family seated, Ah-Kin quickly stood and left the table.

  He returned moments later, his face a study in fear and anguish. “Di-Fo-Lo has been to the Temple of Pai-Ling,” he said. “He has torn down the shrine with his bare hands. He has taken the goddess of mercy and flung her far into the sea.”

  Indie Da Silva left the hospital in Macao to be at his partner’s side. The only other witnesses were Hamish McCallum and Ben’s friend and lawyer, Alistair Pidcock. The tomb was located on the edge of the birch wood, facing the sea and the sunrise; it rose in a gently rounded mound, thickly planted with wild violets and deep-blue periwinkles, to become part of the earth around it. Great bunches of yellow iris surrounded the low arched entrance, sealed with rose-colored quartz. Carved on its face, first in Chinese characters and then in English, were these words:

  HERE LIES A SCHOLAR.

  HER NAME IS LI-XIA DEVEREAUX.

  1906-1924

  She ran from no one and hid from nothing.

  Ben had insisted on personally dressing the body in the rich red silk and extravagantly embroidered finery of a bride of noble birth. He had forced himself to look upon her mutilated face, then covered it with the bridal veil of spiderweb silk, crowning her hair with a single gardenia. A large and perfect pearl was placed on her tongue to show the gods that she came from a well-respected, wealthy family; a cicada carved in milky jade lay in her closed hand, fastened to the fingers by a ribbon so that it could not be lost or stolen. It was, she had once told him, the most powerful talisman against evil spirits in the afterlife.

  In solitude, he had surrounded her with books, carefully choosing each one. By her side he placed a golden statue of Kuei-Hsing, the god of literature. To these he added the photographs retrieved from the temple floor, and the laughing Buddha that Ah-Kin’s wife had carefully restored. The maker of heavenly possessions had worked for a day and a night constructing a house like the one by the river in red and gold paper. In it Ben had placed the letters from Ah-Su and the mung-cha-cha. In a replica of the Lagonda in shining green paper, he had placed two toy dogs of fluffy white, with collars and leashes of red leather; then added a great deal of paper money. The smoke from these hung low across the sea, as though reluctant to break adrift from the Villa Formosa.

  Ben Devereaux stayed alone in the Pavilion of Joyful Moments for a day and a night. Observed but undisturbed by Ah-Kin, he neither ate the food brought to him nor drank the tea. He made no movement and sat as silently as stone. On the third day, Ah-Kin awoke to find him gone.

  PART TWO

  RED LOTUS

  CHAPTER 18

  Little Star

  On an oven-hot November afternoon, the daughter of Ben and Li Devereaux sailed into the vast lake of Tung-Ting in the province of Hunan. Under leaden skies, a great marsh threaded with channels and hidden backwaters stretched along its endless foreshores. At the mouth of the lake, where the Yangtze joined the Yuan River, many of the passengers disembarked—laden with gifts, strings of live crabs, and squealing piglets—to be met with much backslapping, heaving of luggage, yapping dogs, and squalling children.

  Those who needed to cross the lake transferred for the last time to a flat-bottomed sampan, stacked high with sheaves of tall reeds. Among them, with the baby quiet in her beaded sling after being fed for a copper coin from the full breast of a Tanka girl, sat the Fish, weary but certain that her gods had not deserted her.

  No
human hand could steer safe passage through the raging torrents of the Yangtze; through Wind Box Gorge, dodging river dragons through the canyons of Witch’s Mountain and Golden Helmet Pass. When they reached the white-water rapids at the mouth of the Yuan, where the aged planks of the sampan threatened to fall apart like a chicken crate, the Fish saw the spirit of Li-Tieh-Kuai, the crippled beggar, who always appeared to those in distress upon the water. She was certain that his iron staff and gourd of comfort would watch over her and the child until they were safe beneath the roof of her cousin, To-Tze.

  On the far side of the lake, travelers dropped off along the way until only the old woman and the infant remained. The boatman seemed reluctant to enter the shallows of the marsh, demanding the two remaining coins threaded around the Fish’s neck to complete the voyage. Switching the yulow, the long sculling oar, for the long punting pole, he nosed the flat boat into a narrow channel banked by a dense jungle of head-high reeds.

  “There will be no difficulty in finding the one you are looking for,” he said in a voice hushed with caution. “Everyone knows of Old To, the barefoot doctor. The reed-cutters say he talks with ghosts and dances with demons.” He allowed the pole to slide effortlessly through his callused hands with a faint but rhythmic sound.

  “Is the infant sick? Are you unwell? Old To is said to have saved many children brought to him, and made old people young again … even to have given life to the dying.” The boatman looked about him, lowering his words to a whisper. “He is one of great mystery and strange powers,” he muttered uneasily. “One who is Chinese but has eyes that are blue as the lake on a clear day.”

  To the Fish, huddled in the stern too tired to speak, he seemed anxious to be rid of her. With his wide brown feet firmly planted on the bleached wood of the stern, the long pole slipping skillfully and more swiftly through his hands, the boatman asked no more about the old woman or the newborn child mewing from the Tanka baby sling upon her back. The infant was white as a maggot, he thought, with eyes as round and pale as pebbles in a pond. No longer comforted by the sound of his own voice, he fell quiet as they approached the shore.