Last Princess of Manchuria

by Lilian Lee

  They waited for some time before they were admitted to the empress Wan-jung's boudoir.

  Yoshiko was shocked by what she saw. Lying on the bed was a sallow-faced woman with sunken eyes and blackened teeth, smoking opium. All of her movements were tremendously slow. She took a long draw on her opium pipe, closed her eyes, and let out a contented sigh, afloat in the drug's euphoric haze. Was this woman really the empress?

  She looked up lazily at the visitor standing before her bed and regarded her with heavy-lidded eyes. She knew why these visitors had come.

  "Best wishes to Her Majesty the empress!" Yoshiko said formally. "We've brought you a little treat, your favorite."

  Yoshiko took out a finely wrought metal box. When she slid the top open just a crack, the sweet scent of high-grade opium filled the air.

  "I remembered that you liked this kind in particular. I've heard that it's difficult to get here in Tientsin."

  "I have no intention of leaving Tientsin," Wan-jung said coldly.

  "The emperor misses you. He's worried about you."

  "Ha!" she spat. "If only I were like Wen-hsiu. She got a divorce. But can I get a divorce? No! I'm the empress, and empresses don't do things like that."

  She was very agitated and blinked angrily, but her mood changed abruptly, and she began to whimper.

  "It's dragging me down—it's killing me. I can never go back, never be an ordinary person again!"

  Yoshiko saw her chance and sat down on the edge of the bed.

  "Whenever I see you, you always seem so unhappy," she said solicitously, drawing closer.

  "It's not that I'm unhappy," Wan-jung complained. "It's just that I never feel safe. My husband is the emperor—yet he can do absolutely nothing to protect me!"

  She was growing hysterical, trapped in the tangled net of her own emotions. Her life was already half over, and here she was, a lonely, helpless, abandoned woman. She felt as though she were surrounded on all sides by curtains of flame. There was no way out.

  "I might as well be dead!" she screamed. "There's nothing I can do anymore! Just leave me alone and let me live out what's left of this miserable life in peace!" She began crying uncontrollably, like a madwoman. Her shoulders trembled violently as tears of pain and despair streamed down her cheeks. Before anyone realized what was happening, Wan-jung knocked over her opium lamp, and within an instant the bed canopy had caught fire.

  Without a moment's hesitation, Yoshiko picked up a pillow and smothered the little flame. She was a picture of complete calm, for the only thing going through her mind at that moment was that it was a perfect opportunity.

  Looking in through the hole that had been burned in the canopy, Yoshiko saw the empress clearly. She was a pathetic excuse for an empress, to be sure, as she sat shaking and gasping for air like a small, frightened animal.

  Yoshiko regarded her coolly. Wan-jung wore an utterly defeated expression, and her eyes were still full of tears.

  "I have no one! No one!" she mumbled to herself. "Just give me some poison to drink!"

  Cautiously, Yoshiko approached her and slowly wrapped her up in the black fur-lined cape. The fur was thick and soft, and it still held the warmth of Yoshiko's body. An empress in name only, Wan-jung was really just a frail and helpless woman.

  How much stronger I am than you! Yoshiko thought to herself.

  "I'm right here. I won't let anything happen to you," she said, as though comforting a small child. "Be a good girl and don't cry! I'll take you somewhere very safe—to Shanghai. We'll have a good time there. How would that be? Shanghai is a wonderful place. And nobody will be spying on you day and night. Everyone there is a good friend. People there are trustworthy."

  Wan-jung rested her head on Yoshiko's breast.

  "Every day, when I wake up," she murmured softly, "I feel as though there were fifty or sixty people watching my every move. They're like demons sent from hell, always watching. When it gets dark in the palace at night, I get so terrified I break into a cold sweat. Please! Take me away from here!"

  She clung to Yoshiko like a weak vine clinging to the safety of a firm stone wall. She had nowhere else to turn.

  Wan-jung was still for a moment, and Yoshiko waited patiently. When Wan-jung stirred, it was to pull off her jade earrings; she gently fastened them onto Yoshiko's ears. Wan-jung thought Yoshiko's earlobes were especially beautiful now, with flashes of bright green jade dangling from them.

  An imperceptible sneer of contempt flickered briefly at the corner of Yoshiko's mouth, but her voice was warm and soothing.

  "Go ahead. Touch them," she said.

  "They're cold," Wan-jung said, smiling.

  Yoshiko firmly took hold of Wan-jung's hand and pressed it to her earlobe so hard that the earring cut into Wan-jung's hand. Unperturbed, Wan-jung felt her eyelids grow heavy, for she was on the verge of surrendering to a deep sleep. She felt completely safe. Her troubles were over, and this was the most warm and protected place in all the world.

  Yoshiko glanced down at her. She was so naive, such a trusting little creature.

  "Just do as I say, and everything will be fine," Yoshiko instructed and, drawing Wan-jung closer, she held her tight and kissed her gently.

  Wan-jung felt a strangely seductive dizziness come over her. Languidly, she closed her eyes, and her arms went limp.

  Yoshiko's kisses became more forceful, more urgent. . . .

  Afterward, Wan-jung trusted Yoshiko completely, so Yoshiko's plan went into effect the next day. As Yoshiko directed, Wan-jung went to Yoshiko's guest room, where she saw that the carpet by the bed was soiled with vomit. Young Lin, Yoshiko's "husband," was lying on the bed, feigning the listlessness of an invalid. There were traces of blood at the corners of his mouth.

  "My husband and I are grateful for Her Majesty's kind concern," Yoshiko declaimed in a loud, clear voice, for she intended that others in the house would hear. The Garden of Tranquillity was a den of intrigues and petty plots, where none of the staff were entirely above suspicion, and some of them were probably plainclothes policemen. The drama she was performing had to be convincing, and Yoshiko played the part of the caring wife to the hilt, rushing in and out of the sickroom and anxiously reporting her husband's condition to the maidservant.

  "I'm afraid that my husband just isn't accustomed to the climate here. It seems to have caused an old stomach ailment of his to flare up. Perhaps I could trouble you to arrange for an ambulance to take him to the hospital."

  While Yoshiko was in the hall, putting this final touch on the cover story, Young Lin and Wan-jung hurriedly exchanged clothing in the guest room. Young Lin did his best to maintain professional decorum.

  "Please forgive any improprieties, Majesty," he whispered respectfully to the empress.

  Yoshiko gave one final order to the maid before returning to the guest room.

  "I'm going to help him dress. Inform me the instant the ambulance arrives!"

  Next came the most critical part of the drama that Yoshiko was directing and performing for Wan-jung's nosy staff. What they saw as they watched from a discreet distance was an effusively apologetic Yoshiko accompanying the empress back to her bedchamber.

  "Please accept my humblest and most abject apologies, Majesty. I am so ashamed—Your Majesty has been so kind to favor us with an audience, yet we have been nothing but trouble! Please forgive us!"

  The two went inside the empress's room, and Yoshiko shut the door behind them. They were offstage, and Yoshiko turned around to face Young Lin—for it was not the empress at all, but Young Lin disguised in her clothes. He went over to the bed and lay down.

  "You don't need to worry about me, Miss Yoshiko," he said. "I'll be fine on my own. After it's dark, I can find my way out of here."

  Yoshiko had played her part well, but now the first act of the play was over. She regarded Young Lin with detachment. Her face was as cold and hard as the moon.

  And the gun was already in her hand.

  Young Lin was dumbstr
uck and half rose from the bed, but he went numb with shock as icy fear crept from his toes to his head. Even his thoughts were paralyzed. Before he had time to wonder what was happening, Yoshiko placed a pillow over his chest to muffle the sound of the shot and fired the gun into it. He died instantly.

  Yoshiko had no intention of leaving any witnesses behind. This operation was hers—the risk was hers, and the credit would be hers, as well. She would stop at nothing in order to protect the security of this mission.

  She tidied up a bit. Blood was welling up through the pillow and spreading a bright red stain across the snow-white pillowcase. She drew the quilt up over Young Lin's still-warm body.

  "What a shame! Such a handsome boy!" she said in farewell.

  Yoshiko stepped into the hall outside the bedchamber, and her face was instantly masked in worry. She hurried downstairs.

  "Has the ambulance come yet?" she pressed the servants.

  As she spoke, an ambulance drew up and stopped in front of the main gate, and a pair of white-coated medics rushed into the house with a stretcher. They were quick, for in no time at all they emerged from the house and carefully bore the invalid to the waiting car. The turned up collar of the patient's overcoat, and the muffler wrapped around the head obscured the patient's face. The sound of labored breathing came from the inert form. Yoshiko was a perfect picture of concern and distress as she followed her "sick husband" out to the ambulance and climbed in beside him, fussing over him all the way.

  They drove away from the Garden of Tranquillity, but even with the villa behind them, they were still not entirely safe. Although they were on the relatively secure soil of the Japanese concession, they still had to worry about spies and assassins.

  Wan-jung was too afraid to move. She had entrusted herself to Yoshiko, and she held on to Yoshiko's hand as tightly as if her life depended on it.

  The ambulance, of course, was also part of Yoshiko's plan. As the vehicle sped smoothly onward, Yoshiko looked out the window, her eyes riveted on the street. When they came to the barricades at certain intersections, she surreptitiously gave a signal, and they were allowed to pass without stopping.

  Once they were outside the Japanese concession, Yoshiko's expression grew even harder.

  "Where will we stay in Shanghai?" Wan-jung asked.

  "We're going to Manchuria," Yoshiko replied flatly.

  "Manchuria!" Wan-jung exclaimed in shock and disbelief. "Am I still going to be ordered around by the Japanese?"

  Yoshiko said nothing.

  "I won't go!" Wan-jung was becoming frantic. "Why did you trick me? Why are you making me go to Manchuria? Isn't the emperor just a prisoner there?"

  "You are the empress. You have your duty!"

  Wan-jung looked at Yoshiko and saw how tough and capable she was, how unlike herself.

  "And what is that duty?" Wan-jung asked suspiciously. She half rose, but Yoshiko pushed her down firmly.

  "The emperor is to be crowned in Changchun, and you will be there, by his side. That's where you belong, and where you shall remain until the day you die!"

  Wan-jung struggled to break free. She had fallen from one trap right into another.

  "I won't go!" she protested loudly. "I don't trust you! You—"

  But she did not finish what she was saying. Yoshiko placed a chloroform-soaked handkerchief over her mouth, and she lapsed into unconsciousness.

  Yoshiko stared straight ahead, her eyes unwavering and her face devoid of emotion, as the ambulance drove out of the city and then headed into the open countryside. Its destination was an obscure hamlet.

  Back in Tientsin, the calm of the Garden of Tranquillity was broken. Young Lin's body was discovered, and several unmarked cars were sent in hot pursuit of the mysterious ambulance. But Yoshiko expected this to happen and was well prepared.

  The ambulance reached the hamlet and stopped at an isolated cottage. Yoshiko got out, managing, with some difficulty, to half lift and half drag Wan-jung's limp, unconscious form out of the back of the car.

  Waiting behind the cottage, at the foot of a small hill, was a funeral party. They stood in patient silence around an empty coffin. They were waiting for Wan-jung, and now that she had arrived, they wordlessly carried her to the coffin and placed her inside. Then the ambulance was driven into a ditch and camouflaged with twigs and leafy branches. At the same time, Yoshiko quickly changed her costume and transformed herself into a simple peasant woman with a tear-streaked face. It all took less than five minutes.

  The pallbearers put the lid on the coffin and raised it up onto their shoulders. An old man led off the procession, scattering paper spirit money on the ground as he went. Horns and drums struck up a dirge, and the rest of the party—filial sons, friends, and family—set off down the road weeping and wailing loudly.

  As the procession snaked slowly along the country road, a pair of unmarked pursuit cars came whizzing by, scraping past the rustic band of mourners. There was nothing about these solemn peasants to arouse even the slightest suspicion among the pursuers.

  Yoshiko's group made its way back to Tientsin. From there, Wan-jung was taken by boat up to Port Arthur. The operation was conducted in complete secrecy, and Yoshiko's plan came off without a hitch. She had made her mark.

  12

  The Japanese were an unstoppable force: Their power was on the rise, and their arrogance knew no bounds. The emperor and empress were together again, and the half-million square miles of territory and 30 million inhabitants of Manchuria were under Japanese control. The Japanese were right where they wanted to be.

  Pu-yi began to feel uneasy—something didn't seem quite right. He, the empress, and their entourage were kept in isolation, their movements dictated by their Japanese masters. Most disturbing of all was a remark made by the Kwantung Army staff officer Seishiro Itagaki, a squat man with a shaved head and a stony, gray face.

  "The new nation shall be called Manchukuo," he drawled. "The capital will be in Changchun, which will be renamed Hsinching, or 'New Capital.' Five races—Manchu, Chinese, Mongolian, Japanese, and Korean—will share this new nation. However, since the Japanese people have, over the past several decades, made many sacrifices for this land, in many cases laying down their lives, it is only natural that they be given special consideration. Namely, that their legal and political positions should be different from those of other races. . . ."

  Pu-yi found this disconcerting, but the question that troubled him most was this: Were they going to let him be emperor again, or were they merely going to allow him to be the "ruler" of Manchukuo? True, many innocent people had been slaughtered in Manchuria, and Japan had long schemed to colonize the territory. But these matters, along with the questions of how many soldiers Japan would send, how much ore the Japanese would mine, and how much oil, salt, and grain they would cart off—these were all matters of indifference to Pu-yi. Only one question was close to his heart, and it consumed all of his attention: Would he be emperor again? His life would be meaningless if he couldn't be emperor. The old retainers, many of them men in their eighties, who crowded around him appealed to him tearily: It was his sacred duty to serve as emperor, and it was their sacred duty to see that he did so.

  Negotiations dragged on. Careful not to expose the extent of their ambition, the Japanese referred to the time as a "Period of Transition" and promised to install Pu-yi in a year. In the end, they did grant him the title of emperor, but he was an emperor in name only. Nonetheless, the title was enough to satisfy Pu-yi, who willingly ceded any real power and endured the humiliation of being a puppet. The Kwantung Army made his dreams of imperial splendor come true, and he did not dare reproach its leaders for slaughtering countless numbers of his countrymen. He was fearful of offending them.

  Pu-yi's perseverance paid off on March 1, 1934, when he at last became emperor again. Pu-yi and the Japanese haggled until the last minute over one last point: the question of Pu-yi's attire. He insisted on wearing a Ching emperor's traditional dragon-embro
idered robes, but a commanding officer in the Kwantung Army informed him that this was out of the question: Japan was permitting Pu-yi to be emperor of Manchukuo, not of the Ching dynasty! They demanded that he wear the uniform of the commander in chief of the armed forces. But this was one compromise Pu-yi declined to make, and he refused to back down. He wanted to don the robes of a Ching emperor and hear his loyal subjects shout, "Long live the emperor!" The tug-of-war over Pu-yi's costume dragged on and on.

  The day of Pu-yi's coronation arrived. He mounted the high circular platform, erected only that morning and meant to stand in for the Temple of Heaven in Peking, brimming with self-satisfaction. He was wearing the dragon robes—he had won! Someone had to rush off to Peking at the last minute to get this costume from his late father's consort, Jung-hui. It was said that these robes had once been worn by Pu-yi's predecessor as emperor of China, Kuang-hsu. The empress was also splendidly arrayed in a brocade robe and a crown decorated with thirteen phoenixes, the traditional symbol of the empress. The old Ching loyalists also dug up their old ceremonial court dress. They wore coral-beaded caps with trailing pheasant feathers and the coats with crane or golden pheasant appliques—insignia of rank—and long strings of ceremonial beads. Many of them had lost their original strings of precious or semiprecious stones and wore strings of abacus beads instead.