by Bangqing Han
Green Phoenix was vigilant even in sleep and got up at dawn to call for Mama Zhao to get a parcel from Second Sister. It contained her complete attire. Green Phoenix sat on the edge of the bed and loosened her foot bandages to change into new ones. A drowsy Prosperity went back to sleep again. When Green Phoenix had finished her toilet, she woke him up.
The minute he set eyes on her, he looked her up and down in astonishment. She was actually dressed in the colors of mourning: off-white cotton blouse and skirt, pale brown hair yarn, plain black cloth shoes, and plain silver hair ornaments, pins, and earrings. It was an outfit for deep mourning.
She explained without waiting for his questions, “I lost my parents at eight and haven’t had a chance to wear mourning since I entered this house. Now that I’m leaving, I’ll make up for it with three years of mourning.”
On hearing this, he praised her again and again, but Green Phoenix stopped him, saying, “Enough of that; just get going.”
“Let’s go then,” he said.
“You go ahead. I’ll come when I’m ready.”2 And she told Little Treasure to follow him downstairs to get the document box from Second Sister and put it into his sedan chair.
Prosperity went to Prosperity Alley in his sedan chair, where he saw a private ricksha was already parked at the door. When he entered the house, a newly hired servant girl knew him by sight and took him to the main room upstairs. Promotion respectfully handed him the document box and withdrew. Looking about him, Prosperity found that not only was the room fully furnished but there was also a complete array of everyday household utensils. He was full of praise for the arrangement and wanted to see the spare room as well. But the servant girl stopped him, saying there was a guest there.
Soon a string of firecrackers was set off at the front door. Promotion and Mama Zhao rushed in to report, “She’s here!”
The servant girl hastened to light a pair of tall candles in the center room. Green Phoenix came gracefully up the stairs, holding some incense sticks, and knelt down to kowtow toward the direction representing her parents’ spirits. Prosperity tiptoed out of the room and hid himself behind her to watch, but she sensed his presence, turned around, and beckoned to him, “You come and kowtow, too.”
He gave a titter and stepped back. 3
“If you don’t kowtow, you have no business gawping. Go back into the room.” She pushed him through the door and took out the ransom papers from her inner pocket, asking him to check them again. Everything was in order. She then went behind the bed and took a document box out of a red lacquered trunk. It looked rather similar to Prosperity’s document box and contained a new account book and a dozen sales slips.
She put her ransom papers in the box, locked it, and then put it away in the trunk behind the bed together with his document box. Now that things were more or less in order, she told him to stay in the room and then went over to the spare room to send Vigor Qian home.
::
1. [This is part of the ritual for seeking blessings from the deities when a courtesan moves to another house. E.H.]
2. [She does not want Vigor Qian to see her arriving at the new house in the company of Prosperity Luo. E.H.]
3. [If he did, he would be behaving like a son-in-law. E.H.]
CHAPTER 50 :: A rascal’s tactics are aimed at faultfinding, and a slight interruption brings a beating
On the day of Green Phoenix’s move, Prosperity Luo ordered two double tables for both lunch and dinner to give a good showing. At noon, after Vigor Qian had gone home, the guests began to arrive. The first to come was Elan Ge. After inspecting the three upstairs rooms, he was much impressed by the elegant and exquisite decor. He then walked out to the balcony at the rear and saw that it faced White Orchid’s room in Nobility Alley. Through her window, he could see Iron Hua and White Orchid drinking together, enjoying themselves. They nodded in greeting when they saw Elan.
Iron Hua unexpectedly pushed the window open and called out, “Come over if you have time. I’d like a word with you.”
Elan surmised that it was still too early for the meal to commence, so he explained to Prosperity Luo and then walked over to Nobility Alley. He saw to his surprise a group of gaudily dressed ruffians standing at the door as if waiting for something.
After Elan Ge entered the house, a mandarin’s sedan chair followed at his heels and came straight into the parlor. Elan hurried upstairs. White Orchid came out of her room in welcome, invited him in, and asked him to sit down. Iron Hua knew Elan was not much of a drinker and did not bother with the etiquette of pressing wine on him. Elan asked why he had been summoned.
“Did you get Second Bai’s invitation? What’s it about?” Iron Hua asked.
“I’ve just learned about that from Cloudlet.” Elan told him about Devotion Yin’s demand in exchange for the pornographic pictures they had seen at Flora Zhang’s.
“No wonder,” Iron Hua said. “I was just saying, it may not be possible to invite people to Wenjun’s place on account of Lai the Turtle, but why hire a function hall at the Old Banner? So, it’s all down to Devotion’s high spirits.”
As he was speaking, the maid, Sister Gold, came in to get the teacups. She whispered something in White Orchid’s ear. Greatly startled, White Orchid ordered her servant girl to bring a bowl of rice. Iron Hua asked what the matter was.
“Lai the Turtle is here,” White Orchid replied in a low voice.
Iron Hua stuck out his tongue in mock fear. He also asked for rice to be served. As they ate, they heard something shatter in the mezzanine room at the back. It sounded like teacups had been broken. This was followed by loud curses and attempts at mediation. As voices were raised, three or four of the hooligans barged noisily into the parlor as though they were on patrol. They came straight to White Orchid’s door and peered in.
Elan Ge did not feel like staying, and Iron Hua asked him to wait a minute so they could leave together. Not daring to detain them, White Orchid hastily put down her rice bowl, wiped her mouth with a dry towel, and hurried out. She saw Young Commander Lai shouting wildly that he wanted to see what kind of a favorite client was in her room. His underlings were rubbing their fists, spoiling for a fight. Sister Gold and the servant girl tried hard to explain, tugging and pulling at the hangers-on, but there was no holding them back. White Orchid had to go up and press Lai to sit down in his chair and, with a smiling face, gently apologize. Such reasonable behavior made it impossible for the Young Commander to act up, so he restrained himself with a smile. His underlings also changed their tack and blamed the maid and the servant girl for having been tactless.
Presently Elan Ge and Iron Hua left hastily, vacating the room. White Orchid did not dare see them out. “Let’s go,” she said to the Young Commander.
“Go where?” he pretended not to know.
“Into my room,” she said.
He stretched out stiffly in the chair and bellowed, “I’m not going into that room just to fill in a gap!”
When the hooligans and hangers-on heard this, they also put on a rowdy display and refused to budge. But White Orchid held Lai by both hands and pleaded humbly and sweetly with him. At this, Lai submitted and followed her into her room. Sister Gold and the servant girl also did their best to persuade the hooligans to go in.
Young Commander Lai, with his eyes on the floor, walked in and bumped his head into a hanging lamp. It was just a tiny scrape and there was no bleeding, but he looked up and said in annoyance, “Even your rotten lamp tries to bully me!” So saying, he gave the lampshade a tap with his ivory fan, and the glass shattered.
White Orchid remained silent and unconcerned, but Lai’s hangers-on continued to elaborate on his comment. One said, “The paraffin lamp doesn’t recognize you, that’s why you got hit. Now if you were the favorite client, that wouldn’t have happened. It seems the lamp is quite clever.”
“The lamp can’t talk, you see,” said another, “so hitting you in the head is its way of showing that it wants you out,
understand?”
Still another said, “We have no business being here in the main room. Don’t blame the lamp!”
Young Commander Lai paid no attention to these remarks. He merely looked over his shoulder at White Orchid and said, “Never mind the damage. I’ll pay for it.”
She smiled deprecatingly. “Don’t be silly, we didn’t hang our lamp right, so why should Your Young Excellency pay for it?”
Lai was displeased. “Are you turning me down?”
She changed her tune at once. “Why would we turn down generosity from Your Young Excellency? Just now you were saying you’d pay us back, that was why we didn’t dare accept.”
In a good mood again, Lai smiled. His underlings were utterly confused and switched back and forth between criticism and flattery. White Orchid just ignored them and concentrated her attention on Lai.
Lai summoned one of his runners and gave the order that the Complete Imported and Cantonese Goods Store should send over paraffin lamps of all shapes and sizes immediately. Soon the runner returned with a shop assistant. Lai ordered the man to replace all the old lamps in the room with paraffin ones. Following his orders, the shop assistant hung up a bunch of ten such lamps. Seeing that Lai’s displeasure had not completely subsided, White Orchid had to let him do whatever he wanted. Lai, for his part, saw that though she was attentive, she showed neither warmth nor coldness in her attitude and wondered how she was disposed toward him.
Presently he took her by the hand, sat down side by side with her on the edge of the bed, and plied her with questions. She took special care that she answered his questions but did not volunteer any other information. When he asked who had been in the room just now, she was inclined not to tell him. Yet she feared he would use that as an excuse to make trouble, so she told him plainly it was Iron Hua.
He jumped up. “If I’d known it was him, I’d have asked to meet him.”
She made no comment.
The hangers-on clamored in support. “Iron Hua is staying at the Qiao residence on First Avenue. Shall we invite him here?”
“Good idea. Invite him as well as Fourth Qiao,” Lai said in delight. The invitations were written at once, and several other names were added. White Orchid let him do as he liked and neither encouraged nor tried to stop him.
Lai was in high spirits and engaged in all sorts of antics, but he noticed White Orchid was as aloof as ever and his displeasure grew. When the runner returned from his mission to report that the guests were either busy or not at home and that not one was coming, Lai flared up. He called the runner a string of names and dismissed him angrily and then said in a huff, “If they’re not coming, we’ll have a party ourselves.”
Whereupon the call chits for courtesans were written out in a flurry. Lai called more than a dozen girls. As it was already getting dark, a double dinner table was set. Terrified that Lai might find fault with her again, White Orchid signaled Sister Gold to light all the paraffin lamps. The glare dazzled her and the heat made her feverish and sweaty, but Lai was delighted. He applauded and shouted wildly. This was echoed by his hangers-on, and the sound was thunderous. Seated at the table, she waited for the called girls to arrive so she could extricate herself. But as it turned out, Lai just left the called girls sitting around while he forced his attentions on her. It so happened that she received no party calls that night so she had no way out.
In the beginning, she poured a cup of wine for him as routine required, but he raised the cup to her lips and told her to drink it for him. When she turned away, he slammed the cup down on the table. She glanced at him sideways, picked up the cup, and said with a smile, “If you want me to drink, you should offer me a cup. Now you’re giving me what I offered you. Don’t you appreciate a courtesy?” She put the cup down in front of him, also with a bang.
This made Lai smile. He drained the cup and then filled it again and gave it to her. She downed it in one gulp. Everybody at the table gave a cheer. His spirits soaring, Lai wanted to match her cup for cup.
“You please go ahead, Your Young Excellency. I’m not much of a drinker,” she said, frowning.
“You’re still trying to fool me!” he said in astonishment. “You’re well-known for your capacity. How dare you say you’re not a drinker?”
“Your Young Excellency is going to be the death of me,” she said with an icy smile. “With us, drinking is an acquired technique. We can down a large tumbler of wine and then make it come up again; that’s how we learned to drink. At parties, when guests see me draining cup after cup, they all say I can hold my liquor. Little do they know that when I get home I have to bring it all up before I feel all right.”
Lai also sneered. “I don’t believe it, not unless you drink a large tumbler of wine now and then bring it up to show me.”
White Orchid deliberately digressed. “Bring up? Is Your Young Excellency suggesting that I lay something on for you?”
All this while when Lai had been talking to her, she neither teased nor joked, so he was overjoyed at this remark. He stretched out his right hand to pull her into his arms, but she was too quick for him. Pretending to be upset, she screamed coyly and ran away from him. Just then she caught sight of Sister Gold signaling for her behind the bamboo curtain, so she left the room to find out what the matter was.
It turned out that Iron Hua’s household slave, Loyalty, had been sent there to find out how Lai was behaving.
White Orchid gave a brief account of things and then said, “Tell your master that he’s made a racket all this time and has got it in for me. Ask your master if he can do anything about it.”
Before Loyalty could reply, everybody at the table was calling “Maestro,” so White Orchid had to return to the room. Holding his breath and taking care to avoid detection, Loyalty lifted the door curtain and peeped in. He was immediately hit by a gust of hot air. He saw that those seated at the table were either bare-headed or barefoot, and some were even bare-chested. It was even hotter for Lai as he was completely hemmed in by more than a dozen courtesans.
The Young Commander barked at them to make way for White Orchid and told her to come up to the table to join him in the finger game. She excused herself, saying, “I don’t know how.”
He banged the table and shouted fiercely, “How can anyone not know how to play the finger game?”
“But I’ve never learned, so I really don’t know how. Since Your Young Excellency wants to play the finger game, I’ll learn the game tomorrow and play with you after that,” she said.
He glared at her ferociously. Fortunately, a hanger-on interceded on her behalf. “Well, with the maestros, the rule is that they sing; they don’t play finger games. Let’s just tell her to sing something.”
Since she had no excuses for not singing, she started tuning her pipa.
Loyalty saw that the hangers-on were either the spendthrift sons of rich families that had gone down in the world or overseers on the warships garrisoned at Wusong. Fearful of being spotted and questioned about his presence, he withdrew and returned to the Qiao residence on First Avenue to report to his master. Iron Hua gave the matter some thought but could not come up with any good idea, so he set it aside.
The next day, a manservant bearing White Orchid’s card came after lunch to invite Iron Hua to the house. After pondering for a moment, Iron Hua sent Loyalty to find out where Lai had gone to seek his pleasure. He himself then went by sedan chair to White Orchid’s in Nobility Alley.
The minute White Orchid saw him, she broke down in a torrent of tears and set before him her endless grievances. Iron Hua could do nothing but comfort and console her. Worried that Lai might come again, she was anxious to consult with him, but Iron Hua heaved a sigh, at a loss what to do about it.
“I’m thinking of staying at Conical Hat Garden for a couple of days. What d’you think?” she said.
Iron Hua was dead set against the idea; he shook his head and said nothing. She asked why. He replied, “You don’t understand, there’re lots o
f problems. First of all, I can’t speak to Harmony Qi about this. Lai the Turtle is a family friend of his, so it’ll be awkward if he knows about this.”
“Wenjun Yao is there because of Lai the Turtle. What’s so awkward about it?”
His argument collapsed, Iron Hua said nothing.
“Humph! I know what you’re like,” said White Orchid after a long silence, “Whenever I need you to do something for me, no matter how easy it is, you never agree to it. Don’t worry, I’m only telling you first; I’ll speak to His Excellency myself. If Lai the Turtle learns about it, it’ll have nothing to do with you.”
Iron Hua applauded this. “That’s fine. Later on, we’re going to the Old Banner. There’s your opportunity to speak if you want to.”
She snorted and said nothing. They were both of a quiet disposition. Now, with a disagreement between them, they sat facing each other with nothing to say.
Presently Loyalty came back to report, “The Young Commander is taking a carriage ride. He’ll be coming here on his return.”
When Iron Hua heard this, he became quite unnerved. He finally opened his mouth and said to White Orchid, “Let’s go.”
The news about Lai had fanned White Orchid’s anger. She paused for a long time before replying, “As you like.”
Iron Hua told Loyalty to stay behind. If Lai showed up to make trouble, he was to go quickly to the Old Banner and report it. White Orchid left word with Sister Gold to bid Young Commander Lai welcome and just tell him the truth, that she had been called to a party at the Old Banner.
Iron Hua and White Orchid went downstairs together, and each got into a sedan chair. They had barely come out of Nobility Alley when they heard faintly the sound of wheels and hoofs turning into Pebble Road and gaining on them at lightning speed. Soon it was traveling alongside the sedan chairs. Thinking it was Lai, Iron Hua looked out through the curtain. It turned out to be Nature Shi and Second Treasure riding south in separate carriages, probably heading for the same party given by Second Bai. After the carriages had passed, the sedan chairs made their way slowly across Beaten Dog Bridge and along First Avenue in the French concession to the Old Banner. 1 Here, Iron Hua saw an array of sedan chairs and carriages parked in front of the restaurant and realized that Nature Shi must have arrived before them. Many more sedan chairs were coming in behind them.
