And in truth there was restlessness all through that hall when the women heard that one of them had gone home and woman looked at woman and thought, “The times must be better,” and they thought, each one, “It will be my turn next if my man has the wits for it.” And so all were eager to be gone, and mothers lost their calm and slapped their children for small faults they overlooked on other days so that by evening half the children in the hall were crying, and Ling Sao cursed and wished she dared to go home alone by night, but she did not.
Nor were things bettered by a letter that came in a few days from Ling Sao’s elder daughter boasting of the fine rooms she had that had been part of a rich man’s house, and how her husband was given the greatest honor and how they lived better than they ever had and that all was peace for them, and then she said:
“As for me, I do think this enemy is better than we thought and certainly he has dealt well with my daughter and her husband and the city is now very safe and peaceful so far as we can see.”
Well enough Ling Sao knew that her daughter could no more write such a letter than she could read it, and she had had to find a teacher in this school to read it to her, an unmarried female and the only true old virgin she had ever seen, for who knows what nuns in temples are? Now she supposed that Wu Lien had written the letter and she did not dream of doubting what it said, for she was one of those persons who need only to hear that a thing is written down on paper to believe it true.
But the old virgin one said, “I would not put too much faith in it. We still hear of many killed in the streets and of women violated.”
This she said, her nose up, and Ling Sao smiled. What would such a one know of women violated, she thought, but did not speak, except to ask in curiosity:
“Are you a nun, then, lady?”
“Certainly I am not,” that one replied as though she were angry. “I could have married many times, for matchmakers have sought me more times than I can remember, but I have preferred learning and books to all else.”
“I have a son’s wife like you,” Ling Sao said, “but she is to have a child.”
“Ah,” the woman said, as though it was nothing to her and so it was not and Ling Sao went away, having thanked her for the reading.
Then to Orchid and her little daughter she told the good news in the letter and Orchid talked among the women and so the restlessness grew. Now none was more weary of the walls of this place than Orchid was, for it was a place too peaceful for her, this gray building and the smooth spread of grass, still brown with winter, and no noise anywhere except twice a day the sound of hymn-singing in a small temple where they could go if they wished to hear the foreign religion. Orchid went once to see what they did but she could not understand what was said and the singing seemed in her ears like wailing and so she went no more. Then, too, the food they ate every day was the same and tasteless after a while, and she longed for something sweet in her mouth. In the village she was always running out at the sound of the little bell that the vendors of sweets strike to tell of their coming, and she bought barley sticks rolled in sesame seeds or she bought squares of sesame in dark sugar, and best of all she loved that kind of sweet called “cowhide” because it can be chewed so long, and she used to chew it half the day. Her children, too, were restless because they had no toys, and they cried for the small fragile toys they once had that vendors carry to village streets, little clay dogs and dolls, or windmills, or sugar men and women, or else they remembered that they once had kites and lanterns made like rabbits and fish and butterflies, and here they had nothing.
So when Orchid heard how well her sister-in-law did, she thought to herself:
“The city is at peace again and there is no reason why I cannot steal out of the gate some morning and see what there is in the shops. I might even go to visit my sister-in-law, and then if all seems well, I will send word by some one to my children’s father, and we can come home again.”
But she said nothing to anyone, for she was one of those soft stubborn women who pretending always to yield to others yet do what they like because they never tell anyone what they do. So one morning a few days later when her smallest child was asleep and the other playing, she made a yawn before Ling Sao’s face and she lied to her, thus:
“I slept ill last night, and so I am going to my pallet for awhile if it will not trouble you to see to my two and the baby is asleep.”
“Sleep if you like if there is nothing to do,” Ling Sao replied a little sourly. Somewhere she herself had found a little cotton and a spinning spool and she was spinning white thread. But she was the sort of woman who finds work everywhere and if there is none she makes it, and she worked now with some show because she knew Orchid was not like her.
Orchid smiled and went her way into the building and she came out the other door and behind a wall she went to the gate and she knew beforehand that this was a time when the gateman barred the gate and went inside his little house to eat his meal. There was no one now to be seen and she drew the bar softly that he might not hear and she stepped into the street and pulled the gate after her, and if he looked out of his window it would seem that the gate was still closed. It seemed so good to be out that she felt herself a bird set free, and she had a little money in her bosom to spend, too, that she chanced to have there when she ran out of the house that day Ling Tan had told them to go. So she went happily down the street that morning, and there were few people about, for the hour was not yet noon, and it was a fair bright day, clear and cold and the air was strong as she breathed it in and out, and everything about her seemed at peace.
“How surprised my man’s mother will be,” she thought, “when I come back and tell her how peaceful the city is and how there is no reason why we should not go to our home! Nevertheless, I will not go further than the first shop, and then I will turn back.”
So she went on a little further, never knowing that she was being watched by the enemy and had been since she left the gate. Now orders had come down from above that no open evil was to be done in the streets any more but what went on behind walls none knew, and as she passed a public watercloset for men, such as was to be found near any main street, she was suddenly fallen upon by five enemy soldiers who had been watching for a lonely woman to come by that they might draw her in. Such women were very rare now, for what woman would go out alone in these days? When they saw Orchid they thought she must be a courtesan, because she looked so gay, and indeed she had a soft round face, and her body was plump and soft, and her full mouth was red, and they held her fast, and gloated on her for a moment and quarreled for who should have her first.
Orchid was one of those women who live long when they are loved and cared for, but in trouble they die soon. Now as she looked into the black faces of these lust-filled men she was weak already. When one after another those men took their will on her, and no passer-by dared to come into that public place to save her when once they had stared in and seen five soldiers with their guns against the wall, then she was like a rabbit fallen upon by wolfish dogs, and she was helpless. She screamed and then they beat her, and one held his hand over her nose and mouth, and she struggled only a little and then her life went out as easily as a little rabbit’s does, and the last man had to use her dead. When they were through with her they left her there and went away.
Then only did the few pitying passers-by dare to come in and they came in and covered that poor body, and wondered where she came from and they stared at her and wondered again who she was.
“She is a countrywoman,” they said. “She has a village look, and see, her hair is bound on a silver pin such as our mothers used to use, and she wears a short coat and an old fashioned black silk skirt. She is from a village and she did not know how our times are in this city.”
All these passers were men, for there was not a woman to be seen on the streets these days, and they did not know what to do with this body. None dared to take it home, because he might be accused of the death, and at l
ast one head wiser than the others said:
“Let us take it to the white woman, for none will accuse her, and she can bury the body if no one comes for it.”
So they called a ricksha and though the man was unwilling to pull such a load, still when he heard the white woman’s name he hoped for an extra fee and he dragged the load the short way to the gate that Orchid a while before had opened with such pleasure. It was locked now and the gateman had finished his meal and was sitting on his little bench inside picking his teeth as he always did when he was idle, and he heard a scratching on the gate. He rose and opened it and when he saw Orchid he cried aloud:
“Why, this woman was one who sheltered here!”
“Why did you let her out?” the men groaned.
“I did not,” the gateman swore, “I let no woman out.” Then it began to come into his mind what had happened, and why the gate had been open when he had come out of his door. He had wondered if he had been forgetful and left it open, and he had barred it quickly, thinking he must be getting too old and he had been glad there was no one to see what he had forgotten.
“She must have stolen through when I was eating,” he said now and he ran for the white woman, though first he shut the gate fast.
That white woman he found at her prayers, and she came fresh from her prayers and when she saw what had happened her pale face grew yet more stern.
“You did well to bring her here,” she told them all, “for here she has been for many days and her husband’s mother and sister and her two children are here now and I will send for her husband.”
So they all went away content since she took on herself the danger, and the ricksha puller was most content of all because of his fee.
When they were gone, that white woman told the gateman to call others to help him and to carry this poor creature now on the ground into the temple hall, and to lay her there on a long low table. She waited there while he went and until others came and lifted Orchid and carried her away. Then slowly and thoughtfully she went to find Ling Sao and with few words and yet gently enough she told her what had happened.
At first Ling Sao thought the white woman must have mixed Orchid in her mind with the many other women taking refuge in this house. “You are wrong, white woman,” she said. “My son’s wife lies asleep in her bed and I was thinking of going to call her, for her child is awake, and she has slept half the day.”
With no change upon her always sad face the white woman said, “Come with me,” and she took Ling Sao by the sleeve and led her into the hall of the temple, and there on the low table Ling Sao saw it was indeed Orchid, and she burst into wailing, though how this had come about she could not imagine.
“But I saw her not over two hours ago, fat and alive!” she wailed.
And then the white woman told her what they had surmised and again in her bare scanty words and Ling Sao could only listen.
“So it must have been,” she wept, “and such a silly thing this pitiful fool could have done. She has always been secret and stubborn behind her smiles and softness, and by this she has met her death. Oh, send for my husband and my son somehow, for what to do now I cannot say alone!”
“I had thought you would want them,” the white woman said, “and so I will send a messenger out by the water gate tonight when it is dark. Since this one is dead it is useless to risk a life for her by day.”
And still without a tear or a change on her face she told a temple servant to bring a cloth and cover Orchid and to keep watch of her through the day that was left until it was decided what was to be done. To Ling Sao’s hearty weeping she gave no more heed than if it were a child crying, and at last Ling Sao sobbed:
“It is so piteous, and the two little children left with only me, and how shall I find a wife for my son again in such times as these? And yet, white woman, your eyes are dry!”
“I have seen too much sorrow,” that white woman said in her pale clear voice. “I think nothing will ever make me weep again—or laugh.” She lifted her yellow eyes and seemed to look off into something she saw that Ling Sao could not see. “I think my heart will not stir again until I come into my dear Lord’s presence,” she said.
Now it was Ling Sao who stopped weeping and because she was so astonished.
“But they told me you were never wed!” she cried.
“No, I am not, in the earthly way you mean,” that white woman said, “but I have given myself to God, to the one true God, and one day He will take me to Him.”
This she said and Ling Sao was so aghast at what she heard that her tears were dried for the time and she could only mutter, “O-mi-to-fu,” to protect herself from foreign magic.
“And you,” the white woman said, bringing her pale eyes down upon Ling Sao and piercing her through with their light, “God wants you, too, dear soul. It may be that He has brought this sorrow upon you to soften your heart to bring you to Him.” At this Ling Sao grew most heartily afraid and she began to back away from that white woman.
“You must tell him I cannot come,” she said quickly. “I have my own husband and now these two children to look after and I am a woman full of cares and I never left my own house before this.”
“In your own house too you can serve God,” the white woman said, and as she spoke she came toward her, and now Ling Sao was terrified and it seemed to her this white woman grew taller and taller by some magic and she towered white and tall and Ling Sao gave a great scream and ran out of the temple and across the grass and into the hall where the women and the children were, and there gasping and crying she told them all about Orchid and how the white woman’s god had caused her to be killed.
In as little time as she took to tell it she had every woman frightened too, lest this foreign god would so kill them all, and there was such a panic that the serving women heard the noise and ran in and then that teacher who had never married, and it took all they could say to bring calm again and to tell the women what the white woman meant and even so they did not quite believe, and if it had not been that Orchid had fallen into such trouble when she went out of the gate, those women would have now run out together and they only begged that the white woman would not come near them at least until they could go home safely.
By the time all this had taken place it was near to nightfall, and she put the children to sleep and they slept, being still too young to know what it meant to have their mother dead. Beside them Ling Sao sat, weak from all the day had brought, nor had she eaten, and she waited to see if Ling Tan and their son would come. Half way between sunset and midnight she heard footsteps and she looked up and saw the door open and there stood the gateman motioning to her and she rose at once and picked her way among the sleepers. Outside in the cold darkness stood the two men she watched for, and never in all her life had she felt such comfort in her heart. She began to weep again and she turned from one to the other, sobbing and crying.
“Oh, my man—oh, what has befallen us? Oh my son—what shall I do for you?”
The white woman had herself met the two men and told them what happened and at this moment she came again and at the sight of her Ling Sao’s tears dried, but she was not afraid now that her husband was here and she could draw near to him.
“Come with me,” the white woman said, and so they followed her into the room she prayed in, and where she read her sacred books, and they sat down as she asked them to do, and she told them that if they wished she would find a coffin for Orchid and for the time being bury her here.
“Then when better times come you may take her away and put her into your own ground,” she said, “if that would make you happier.”
They looked at each other, and Ling Tan spoke for the others. “There is no way now whereby we could get a coffin and a body out of the city and so we must do as you say and give you our thanks. Your mercy is beyond our understanding and it is not often found even around the four seas.”
“There is no merit in me,” the white woman said. “I do it in the
name of the true God, whom I serve.”
To this none made reply because none knew what she meant except that Ling Sao grew afraid again and now she made up her mind that she would go back this very night with Ling Tan. When he rose to go, she rose also.
“I go home with you,” she said to him.
“Indeed, you shall not,” he said. “The times are not calm yet, and I do not know what our life is to be with these victors we have to rule us.”
“I go with you,” she said stubbornly.
Now he knew his woman, and he knew the look on her round dark face and that nothing he could do would keep her here if she said she was going.
“Curse you for the stubborn daughter of a stubborn mother,” he said, “and shall I be to blame if you fall into evil?”
“Whatever happens to me I will blame no one except myself,” she said.
But he was still not ready to yield. “What of our little daughter?” he said. “Will you leave her here alone?”
For the moment Ling Sao was confounded, but the white woman spoke before she could.
“If you go,” she said, “leave your daughter with me. We had in good times a girls’ school here, but now the school is moved and all the pupils are a thousand miles up the river in free land. It happens that tomorrow others go on a foreign ship and guarded by two of my countrymen and their wives, and she will be safe and when you want her back you shall have her.”
Those other three looked at each other and weighed what to do and again Ling Tan spoke for them all. “If the times were right it is not a thing we would think of doing, for we would take care of our own daughter and marry her to a good man, but who dares now to marry or to take into his house even for his own son a young girl? Let it be as you say—only tell us sometimes if she still lives.”
“She will learn to write and tell you herself,” the white woman said kindly enough, and to this the others said nothing. In the old days Ling Tan would have laughed at the thought of a daughter of his learning to read and write, but now in these times when families were divided in many places, he could see the use of such learning.
Dragon Seed: The Story of China at War (Oriental Novels of Pearl S. Buck) Page 18
