Last Princess of Manchuria

by Lilian Lee

  He sighed lightly, a faint smile playing at his lips. He was as helpless as a baby and, in this semiconscious state, lacked the will to deceive himself—he saw that the woman sitting before him was very pretty. Freed from worry and inhibition, feeling neither fear nor animosity, he forgot who he was. He had a sensation that was like the gentle caress of a spring breeze, or the first tentative thaw after a heavy snow. Was it just the drug that made him feel this way? Or was it something more? Entranced by the spell of her beauty, he was transported back to their first meeting.

  He reached out, and she grasped his hand, placing it on her left breast. Only a thin layer of silk separated his hand from that carefully guarded treasure.

  She felt as though the world had been completely cleansed—purified for this new beginning, and a maternal feeling welled up in her as Yun Kai fell into a deep sleep. She felt like a mother welcoming back an errant child, her own flesh and blood. She had only hated him because he had hated her. The hard lines of her face softened—she might be capable of murdering anyone in the world, but she could never harm him. Even if she spent the rest of her life in solitude, she would always have this night, she reflected as she gazed down at him and gently stroked his handsome face.

  "Ah-fu," she whispered softly.

  The old samisen master was singing in his quavering voice, telling an ancient Japanese tale to the strains of the samisen:

  Throughout recorded time,

  All living things have been at war.

  Spring flowers turn to dust,

  As white bones turn to ash.

  But the river flows ever on, ever on,

  Red leaves dance wildly in the wind. . . .

  The soothing melody carried her away, but she was jolted out of her reverie by the harsh bell of the telephone. Feeling somewhat disoriented at first, she heard the person on the other end of the line speaking to her in a foreign language—Japanese. It was one of Uno's flunkies. She was back in the real world.

  The Lucky Crane was the most expensive restaurant in Tientsin. Located in the Japanese concession, it was also the only place in town that served fugu, puffer fish. A pair of large, round puffer-fish-shaped lanterns hanging in front of the shop announced this fact. Fugu was a Japanese delicacy that had to be prepared with great care by a trained master—an improperly cleaned fish could be lethal. The Lucky Crane's proprietor had twenty-five years' experience in preparing fugu and had come to China to open a business that catered to a Japanese clientele. It was currently the height of the fugu season, and some especially large and plump fish had just come in. Tonight, the entire restaurant was reserved for a private party. The host: Shunkichi Uno. Yoshiko was on the guest list.

  This rather astounded her. Why had he bothered to get in touch with her? she wondered. What business did he want with her? Was it about Yun Kai? She would have to be very careful.

  One of the courses was puffer-fish fins, roasted over coals until they were half-cooked and then poached in warm sake. Eaten lukewarm, they had an unusual and slightly smoky flavor. It was definitely an acquired taste.

  Yoshiko raised her glass.

  "Here's to you, Daddy!"

  Uno pinched her cheek. "You've gotten a bit thin."

  "If you saw me more often," she said testily, "little changes in my appearance wouldn't seem so sudden."

  He picked up a thin morsel of fish with his chopsticks and popped it into his mouth, fixing her with a steady gaze as he chewed.

  "Rumor has it that you took a resistance man home with you," he said offhandedly.

  "He was involved in that riot at Tung-hsing Lou," she answered quickly. "I had to interrogate him personally, of course."

  She poured him a cup of sake and then poured one for herself.

  "Where are you holding him?"

  Uno knew perfectly well where Yun Kai was, but his smooth voice betrayed nothing.

  "When did you start concerning yourself with my methods of interrogation?" Yoshiko laughed.

  "I trust you implicitly, of course," he said.

  Afraid of giving herself away, Yoshiko moved to pour more wine.

  "Have another cup," she offered him.

  "I don't think I'll have any more. I need to keep a clear head. Too much drink affects my judgment. You shouldn't drink too much either, you know."

  "Don't worry about me!" she snapped. "I know the difference between what's business and what's personal!"

  A moment later, she said sheepishly, "I haven't had a drink with you in so long—am I still the samurai's sword?"

  Uno laughed heartily, but he didn't touch his drink.

  "If you could only see yourself!"

  The proprietor himself was serving them, and he now brought out a porcelain plate with a fine multicolored glaze. A circle of thinly sliced fugu was arranged on the plate in the shape of a chrysanthemum in full bloom. Yoshiko took a bite, and the flavor was very delicate. She changed the subject.

  "It's nice and sweet. It tastes very fresh!"

  "We have a saying in Japan," Uno said casually. "People who eat fugu are idiots; and people who don't eat fugu are idiots, too."

  She knew he was trying to get at her, but how much did he really know?

  He went on.

  "Fugu has a very fast-acting venom, which is often lethal. People who eat fugu are stupid, because they risk death with every bite. On the other hand, people who are afraid to try it are equally stupid, because they're missing out on one of life's choicest delicacies. Do you like fugu, Yoshiko?"

  "Yes, I do. Very much," she replied calmly. "This isn't the first time I've eaten it, you know. If you eat a lot of fugu, you can build up a resistance to the venom and become immune to a host of other poisons, besides. So the more you eat, the longer you'll live!"

  Uno let out a burst of amused laughter that stopped just as abruptly as it started. He searched her face, hoping to find some crack in her armor, but his quicksilver changes of mood put Yoshiko on her guard. She uneasily tossed some vegetables and bean curd into the clear, boiling broth of the hot pot they were sharing, her movements a bit too hurried. Everything was dancing and churning in the bubbling soup. The flame was very hot.

  "It's ready."

  She took out a few slices of cooked fish and carefully set them on his plate.

  "Some people say that women are like cats—both are attracted to the smell of fish," he said. "The Chinese say that once a cat bites down on a fish, it's all but impossible to take it away."

  "You know a lot about the Chinese, don't you, Daddy?"

  She thought she detected a note of jealousy in his voice. Then again, perhaps it wasn't jealousy at all, but rather her own wishful thinking. Sometimes she wished she were still his personal property, but she understood him too well. It was only his male desire to control that caused that possessive note to creep into his voice. Even if he didn't think very much of her anymore, news of her other lovers pricked him—like a fish bone stuck in his throat, not coming up or going down. So tiny, yet so irritating— and dangerous, too. If it went the wrong way, you could be paralyzed.

  "Chinese folk sayings are fascinating. But that's the problem with the Chinese—even when they die, their mouths just keep on talking, heaping insults on each other. What a third-rate nation! You probably hate China, too, don't you, Yoshiko?"

  She looked at him with disdain.

  "I thought we were talking about cats."

  "Hm? Yes, so we were. I said women were like cats, Chinese cats."

  "Chinese cats are the most vicious!" She made a frightening face, all bared fangs and swatting claws. "They'd rather eat their newborn kittens than let anyone else do so much as touch them!"

  "Really? They must have a lot of guts," he said in mock surprise; but there was also a subtle threat in his voice, as if he were again testing her.

  Uno's remark sent Yoshiko into a fit of laughter, and she threw back her head, her entire body shaking with mirth.

  "Daddy! Do you think I'm like a cat?" She giggled. "D
o you?

  She drained her glass in one gulp.

  What was she living for? A nation? And if so, what nation? Like someone caught between opposing sides in a tug-of-war, she was doomed to come up empty-handed. But cozying up to one side wasn't any good either. Sometimes she really did hate China. The flag of Manchukuo, with its multicolored stripes, was supposed to symbolize the harmony among the nation's five races— Chinese, Manchu, Mongolian, Muslim, and Tibetan. But what was a flag except for a limp piece of cloth that couldn't even stand up on its own? Ching Empire, indeed! What a farce! The so-called empire was just another Japanese colony. Yoshiko dreamed of dying in battle and going to heaven, where she could command both Japan and Manchukuo from on high. Reality was much harsher—she was just a caged animal, a caged cat.

  "You'd best get back and take care of that business," Uno said meaningfully.

  Yoshiko faced Yun Kai with mixed feelings, for she knew she could no longer hold him.

  His brief convalescence left him thinner and more angular, with prominent cheekbones and brows. While a few days of treatment by a good doctor had healed his wounds, his face remained pallid beneath a blue-black stubble. His grim expression and weary air made it seem as though he bore the suffering of the nation on his young shoulders.

  In better times, he might have remained an actor, a Monkey King, somersaulting into middle age until he opened his own studio and took in students, passing the secrets of his art on to another generation. On the other hand, he would have been dead right now if Yoshiko's shot had struck higher.

  "I want to leave," he was telling her.

  Yoshiko sat down with a flounce.

  "Who said you had permission to leave?" Yun Kai was taken aback. The old hard expression returned to her face—or was it just a mask she wore to hide her true feelings?

  "Sit down!" she commanded with a theatrical air. "Your organization is in bad shape—workers and college students have been arrested in droves. The minute you walk out the door, you'll be signing your own death warrant."

  "What makes you think I'd want to hide out here?" he demanded. "Only a coward would do that!"

  Yoshiko sneered. Deciding to change her tack, she assumed the tone of voice she used for interrogations.

  "What do you mean 'hide'? You're not hiding from anyone here—you are my prisoner. I am your interrogator, and you'd better get that straight!

  "Sit down!" she repeated. "If you don't, I'm going to have to keep on craning my neck to talk to you."

  He sat down heavily.

  "I have nothing to say. I will never betray my countrymen!"

  "Actually, what I had in mind was telling you to disband your little organization. You and your friends are trying to use eggs to break boulders—you overestimate yourselves." She seemed to mull it over. "Besides, I'm your countrywoman, too, am I not?"

  By way of demonstration, she walked over to the small altar where she kept the ancestral tablets and where she paid tribute to her illustrious forefathers. Her family name, "Aisin-Gioro," was written in her own hand. She pointed to the altar, hoping he would understand.

  "I have never even for a minute forgotten that I am a member of the Ching imperial family, and that I am Chinese. We were born of the same root, you and I. We should work together, not at cross-purposes."

  Yun Kai didn't see it that way at all.

  "You are a killer of Chinese!" he said angrily.

  She bowed her head, thinking. His intractable attitude was getting to be more than she could bear. Those Chinese refused to understand her, and she hated them for it.

  "In times of conflict, it is unavoidable that a few drops of blood will be spilled," she said bitterly. "And in the long run, what does it matter? Think about it: What does China have? Money? No! Modern weapons? No! The only thing that China has is so many people, they can't even be counted. And most of them have neither ability nor ambition. Life is cheap. What does it matter if a bunch of them die, especially when those deaths will buy hundreds, perhaps thousands, of years of peace and stability? I'd say it was worth it. That's one of the lessons of history."

  "You think you're so clever!" he said scornfully. "If you're so smart, why don't you see that the Japanese are just using you to further their own aims?"

  "It might seem that way to someone who is interested only in appearances," she sneered. "Just wait until the game is over, and then you'll see who's been using whom!"

  Yun Kai was just a boy who had spent his whole life in the make-believe world of the theater—who could expect him to understand the intricacies of politics? He was strong but simple— all he knew was that Chinese were too busy killing Chinese to notice that a foreign army was taking over their native land, and it filled him with sorrow.

  "There's an old saying: 'A loyal minister can't serve two masters.' I never went to school, but I learned a lot from the plays I act in. I know about loyalty, integrity, and respect for one's elders. Loyalty and integrity give a man courage, and they're the hallmarks of true patriotism."

  "Hey, not a bad speech! You're a good student. But what you say only proves my point—the Chinese are slaves at heart, what with all their talk of'loyalty.' The Chinese haven't changed a bit in thousands of years—they always have to have an emperor to tell them what to do. These days it's the Nationalists versus the Communists, but don't let it fool you—they're all the same. All that any of their leaders really wants is to be emperor, to be the savior who rights all the world's wrongs."

  "That's not what the students I know say."

  "Students? What students?" She shot him a quick look. "They've all been executed!"

  Yun Kai felt as though he'd been punched in the stomach, but he leapt to his feet.

  "Executed?" His ashen face was suddenly flooded with color. They were his comrades in arms. Bound together by their hatred of a common enemy, they had marched hand in hand, side by side. He would have laid down his own life at a moment's notice—but they needed to live! Unbidden tears streamed down his face.

  "You're the only one who's still alive," Yoshiko said icily.

  She had rescued him from the jaws of death, but he didn't feel grateful in the least.

  "Why kill college students?" he sobbed in anguish. "They had education—they were worth much more than someone like me. If it would bring them back, I'd have you kill me right now!

  He paused.

  "I swear I'll fight you to the death!" he spat.

  Yoshiko's heart sank, but disappointment soon gave way to anger, as her temper reached the boiling point. All her efforts on his behalf had been wasted!

  "I know a brave man when I see one," she said with barely suppressed rage. "Courage is a virtue I value highly—which is why I had you freed. Yet you are still my enemy? Who do you think you are?"

  He stood up proudly and faced her. When he spoke, there was not a trace of gratitude in his voice.

  "So I owe you my life. Take it back, if you want it! It's yours!" He stared at her levelly, speaking slowly and clearly, as though making a vow: "As long as I draw breath, I shall be your enemy!"

  He dropped his head and walked out.

  "Halt!" she shouted after him. The gun was in her hand, and she was aiming it squarely at Yun Kai.

  He stopped in his tracks and turned to find himself staring straight down the barrel of a gun. She had shot him once before—he knew she wasn't stingy with bullets. He hesitated only a moment before recovering his courage. With one last glance at her, he turned and headed toward the door, still limping a little on his injured leg. He walked with his head held high; the gun sights were trained on the center of his back. One step, two steps, three steps. He wasn't afraid to die.

  A shot rang out.

  He stopped and closed his eyes, frozen in place. When he opened his eyes again, he realized that the bullet had whizzed past his ear, singeing his hair.