My Splendid Concubine

by Lofthouse, Lloyd

  Robert joined Parkes as he attended endless funerals while Chinese bands played music in the background. The Chinese seemed to celebrate every funeral as if it were a birth and not a death.

  However, he’d seen enough death and stopped attending the funerals. With Ayaou and the baby in his thoughts, he decided to risk his life and see her one more time before he sent her to Macau. Now that she was pregnant, there was no way she was going to stay in Canton.

  Chapter 34

  Robert had crossed the roofs risking life and limb a second time. Inside the house, he led Ayaou to the bedroom. As stark as this worn-out house was, the bedroom was the closest to being a home of sorts. The other rooms made him feel uncomfortable as if they were designed to be coffins.

  “Guan-jiah, I want you too.”

  “Master?” Guan-jiah looked shocked as if he were going to be asked to join them on the sleeping mat and take part in the lovemaking.

  “Don’t worry,” Robert said, stifling his laughter while keeping his face composed. “I only want to talk. You’re both going to Macao tomorrow.” Robert held out twenty pounds. “Take the money.” It was more than one-hundred-twenty yuan.

  “I am not leaving without you,” Ayaou said.

  “You have no choice!” Anger flooded his face, and his voice roared. “Do not be difficult now! This is not the time or place!”

  She talked louder. “I have never been to Macao. I do not know what the place is like. I might get lost there. You might not find me. My father told me it happened to a concubine that belonged to Captain Patridge. He forgot about her!”

  Swallowing the anger, he said, “You have nothing to worry about.” He caressed the side of her face. “Guan-jiah will look after you and stay in touch with me.”

  “You want to get rid of me, because I carry your child.”

  He threw up his hands in frustration. “What am I going to do with you?” No matter what he said or did, he couldn’t convince Ayaou that he wasn’t going to abandon her. “I curse your father for the poison he planted in your head. I curse the fortuneteller who has filled your mind with nonsense.”

  “Do not talk about my father like that. If my father told me to leave you, I would.”

  Guan-jiah moved between them.

  “Leave the room,” Robert said.

  Hurt appeared on the eunuch’s face, but he didn’t move. Guan-jiah was a gentle man. Robert doubted he’d hurt a fly. “It’s okay. You may leave.”

  The eunuch’s words came in a rush with nervous gulps of air between phrases. “No, Master, I have never seen you this angry—you might hit her—she deserves it—but you said I was the child’s adopted uncle.”

  Guan-jiah shifted his gaze to his feet then his words came slower. “It is my duty to protect him. I have to protect him. You know that I would help you beat her if it weren’t for him. Beat me instead.”

  Robert’s anger evaporated. Guan-jiah was willing to die to protect the unborn child. The look in his eyes said so. Robert pitied any Taiping that came near Ayaou in her condition for it was obvious Guan-jiah would fight to the death.

  Ayaou had dropped to the sleeping mat and was staring at the floor with a lost look. She rubbed dirt off her feet.

  “You went outside against my orders!” His heart leaped into his throat.

  “You do not own me. Ward does,” she replied.

  Without thinking, he raised a hand as if to slap her. Guan-jiah grabbed his wrist. “No, Master, you cannot hit her. You are letting her words stir evil. Do not damage the child. I promise to beat her after the child is born.”

  Robert stepped back. “You’re going to Macao where you and our child will be safe,” he said. “Guan-jiah, if you have to, stuff her in a burlap sack and carry her there.”

  She dropped to her back and stared at the ceiling—her face a mask of pain and defeat.

  “She’ll calm down,” Robert said. “Let’s go in the other room and brew a pot of tea so we may plan how you two are going to leave the city safely. Have you ever been to Macao?”

  “No, Master.”

  Chapter 35

  For the next few months, Robert buried himself with work in an attempt to avoid thinking about Ayaou. He wanted desperately to stabilize the situation with the Chinese, so he could be with her again. To achieve this, he glued himself to Parkes, and they went everywhere together as battles raged in and around Canton.

  The world turned to black and white with occasional violent flashes from the British and French cannons and rebel rockets. Without Ayaou, there was no color in his life. Even the food lost flavor. He couldn’t tell the difference between a sip of water and sweet plum pudding.

  He thought about Payne Hollister often. Determined to deal with him, he contacted people in Hong Kong. They found an address. He wrote a letter.

  “Hollister, I read your lies. I find it amazing that you still hold a grudge after all these years.

  “Yes, I admit that something happened with Me-ta-tae. Something I regret. It happened once and was over in moments.

  “If forcible intercourse with Shao-mei wasn’t enough to satisfy your anger and you still want revenge, I’m willing to offer you satisfaction. Your choice, swords or pistols? Name the time and place. I will be there. That is, unless you are a coward.”

  To prepare himself, he improved his sword skills by practicing with a British major. They worked for hours most evenings until Robert was drenched with sweat. He didn’t worry about his skill with a pistol. He’d always been a good shot. Even as a child, he’d been a better shot than his father had.

  His motivation ran deeper than he wanted to admit. Every time he practiced, he imagined what it would feel like to kill Hollister and make him suffer as Shao-mei had.

  Weeks went by and there was no reply from Hollister. Robert had no way to know if the letter had reached him. One good thing came of it—writing that letter and sending it put the episode concerning Me-ta-tae behind him. Confronting his guilt regarding the seduction of Me-at-tae and his willingness to die to atone for it helped him shed that sin.

  He continued to practice with the sword. After all, Hollister might appear any day.

  A court-martial commenced for three Royal marines. Robert acted as the interpreter for the Chinese witnesses. Seventeen charges had been brought against these men—charges for assault, attempted rape, robbery and murder. During their questioning, it became apparent that they believed they could do anything they wanted to the locals.

  The affair disgusted him, but he kept his opinions to himself since most British and French didn’t feel the way he did.

  The punishment for the criminals was light compared to the crimes they had committed. Their victims could have included Ayaou or Guan-jiah. Those soldiers should have been shot. Instead, they were reduced in rank, spent thirty days in the stockade and then sent back to duty. The message said a Chinese life was worthless.

  He hated the fact that his parting with Ayaou had been bitter. To compensate, he wrote letters to her on a daily basis. It felt as if he were bleeding his misery onto the paper.

  China did not have a proper postal system, and it wasn’t easy finding a way to mail his letters and have them delivered. As impossible as the idea seemed, he swore if an opportunity presented itself in the future, he would do what he could to remedy that situation and create a Chinese postal system.

  He dreaded going to bed because all he did was think about her, and he often saw her dead like Shao-mei. To avoid the nightmares, he stayed late in the mess playing chess or joining conversations with British army officers.

  When alone, he struggled to read by lantern light in his small cubbyhole of a room, but thoughts of Ayaou kept intruding. He often had to read the same pages several times.

  The attacks against the city continued. Noise from rockets, rifle fire or cannons was a constant companion.

  He had to do something to ease his loneliness. Slowly, he made friends among the military officers. He also made friends with a few o
f Canton’s Imperial Chinese officials he met as part of his job. When invited to eat at their houses, he felt more at home than he did in his quarters.

  A British gunboat brought the first letter from Macau. He was disappointed when he discovered it was from Guan-jiah—not Ayaou.

  “Master,” Guan-jiah wrote, “Ayaou believes you will abandon her. She has seen other foreigners do this to their concubines. To protect herself, she is busy tearing her passion and love for you out of her heart and head as if they were strands of gray hair. She is attempting to murder her feelings with poisonous words and thoughts.

  “I know how much you love your concubine. It would be a tragedy if she stays in Macau. It is time to risk our lives and have us return to Canton. Even if we die, it would be better than the changes Ayaou is going through.”

  Robert thought Guan-jiah was wrong. Ayaou could never believe he’d abandon her. He had risked his life to take her from Ward, and she had risked her life to save him from the Taipings.

  “Master,” Guan-jiah wrote in another letter, “You do not understand that it is only natural for Ayaou to fall back on her family and their Chinese ways to survive. Believe me when I say that the fear of being abandoned has never left her and is growing stronger.”

  He threw that letter away believing Guan-jiah was filling his mind with delusional thoughts. Robert had not forgotten Guan-jiah’s opinions of boat people.

  Family was important to the Chinese, and the eunuch had no family in Macau. He’d been away from Ningpo too long. He probably wasn’t getting along with Ayaou’s family.

  He’d had a conversation about this topic with Guan-jiah years before. “My great-grandmother was from the boat people,” his servant had said. “Great-grandfather was Han Chinese. He was a village farmer, who only owned one acre and couldn’t afford a better woman.

  “My grandmother was trouble like all boat people,” Guan-jiah had said. “My great-grandfather was fortunate when she died in childbirth without giving him the curse of a daughter.” It was regrettable that Guan-jiah harbored a bias against these boat people.

  It amazed him that the Chinese, with all the different languages and dialects, managed to make the culture work.

  He saw the irony in the fact that Europe had imported its problems to China disturbing what had once been a peaceful kingdom. The Taipings were converted Christians led by a false prophet. Having them in China was like setting fire to brush soaked in oil.

  Although Robert had no way to have his letters carried to Macao where Ayaou’s family lived, Guan-jiah sent news through the British consular mailbags out of Hong Kong. It couldn’t be easy for the eunuch to make this happen.

  In one letter, Guan-jiah suggested that Robert write to Ayaou care of the Hong Kong consulate. He followed his servant’s advice. When she didn’t respond, he started to have doubts. What if Guan-jiah’s warnings were true? He dashed off another letter to Guan-jiah asking why Ayaou hadn’t replied.

  Guan-jiah wrote back that he had tried to get Ayaou to write. She wouldn’t listen. It was as if she were mute.

  “Master,” Guan-jiah wrote, “since we have been in Macao, Ayaou found Mr. Yin-Yang’s replacement, a Mr. Sua-min, another fortune teller. He has become the guru of her spiritual life.

  “Ayaou is convinced you are the moon’s reflection in the water that Mr. Yin-Yang predicted, and that she will never truly have you. Mr. Sua-min told Ayaou to get as much money as she can from you while you are still part of her life.

  “Mr. Sua-min is a thief. I believe he will take the money you send her for his services.

  “Master, if she asks for money, do not give it.”

  Robert believed Ayaou would never cheat him even for a fortuneteller, and he ignored Guan-jiah’s advice. He was sure that the love Ayaou felt for him was too strong for anything like that to happen. Whatever she was going through, it wouldn’t last.

  He spent sleepless nights fantasizing that things would return to the way they had been in Ningpo during the best of times. Life would be as it had been when Shao-mei was alive. They would laugh over Chinese ink paintings, poetry, music and haircuts. He followed Uncle Bark’s advice and only thought about the good times they had together.

  In July, Ayaou sent one of her cousins to Canton. The fifteen-year-old girl’s name was Fooyen. The note she handed Robert asked for one hundred yuan.

  “Why so much?” he said.

  “The money is for the family,” Fooyen replied. “The junk needs repairs. It is old and leaks. We have borrowed enough that we will never be able to pay back in this life. The moneylenders will not give us more. If the junk sinks, we will all die. It is where we live. It is how we make our living.”

  He gave the girl a hundred and twenty-five-yuan, more than Ayaou wanted. He also trusted Fooyen to deliver the letters he’d written that he hadn’t sent.

  Fooyen became their messenger, and he kept up a correspondence with Ayaou for the next few months. Her only replies were when she asked for money, and he sent it.

  It was through Fooyen that Robert learned how to find Ayaou in Macao.

  In December 1858, Robert went to Parkes and requested ten days leave. Since the rebel activity had subsided, the commissioner granted the request. He sailed on one of the British gunboats to Hong Kong where he transferred to another ship and arrived in Macao’s crescent shaped bay late in the afternoon.

  Macao was a Portuguese colony and the wooded hills were crowded with houses that were light blue and pink and yellow. The architectural style was that of Southern Europe. The Portuguese had first settled here in 1557, almost three hundred years before Hong Kong became a British Crown Colony.

  The hulls of the junks crowding the harbor were painted red. Other junks sailed into the bay with the sunlight gleaming off tan and beige matted sails. It was difficult to believe that war with the Taipings and other rebels was raging throughout most of China.

  Piles and baskets full of fish crowded the dock where he went ashore. More fish were spread to dry on the junks’ roofs. Rusty colored fishing nets had been hung from tall masts to dry in the afternoon sun.

  A coolie offered him a ride for a small price. He climbed into the rickshaw and off they went down Praia Grande Avenue, which was shaded by banyan trees. Turbaned East Indian police directed traffic.

  When he found Cousin Weed’s junk, he had to cross three other boats to reach it. The first familiar face he saw belonged to Guan-jiah. He went up to his servant and took hold of his hands. “It’s good to see you, my friend,” Robert said.

  Guan-jiah looked embarrassed and pleased at the same time.

  The distance the Chinese put between servants and masters unsettled Robert. Since he’d never had servants before coming to China, this was something he had trouble getting used to. To him, Guan-jiah was his equal and shouldn’t be calling him master. He had trouble seeing himself as the master of any person.

  Robert had been raised a Wesleyan. His father was a pastor and taught his twelve children that all men and women were equal. It also bothered him that Ayaou thought of herself as the property of a man.

  He didn’t think about it often but when he did, it was with pangs of guilt. For that reason, he never mentioned Ayaou to friends and family in the letters he wrote to Northern Ireland. They’d never understand.

  He doubted Ayaou would be treated as an equal. He suspected that the beliefs of his family did not include people outside their own race. Over time, Mary and his mother might accept Ayaou, but he didn’t want to take the chance that they would hurt her feelings. He loved her too much to subject her to that form of cruelty.

  “Chou Luk is here,” Guan-jiah said. “Master, it would please Ayaou if you greeted him first. It is only proper.”

  Every time he talked to Chou Luk, he only heard bad news. “Where is the old man?” Guan-jiah bobbed his head and led the way. They found the Chou Luk sitting aft in the shade with two young girls cooling him with large handheld fans.

  He tried not to stare.
Chou Luk had aged and gained weight. A lot of his hair had fallen out and what remained looked greasy and stringy. The flesh on his face sagged and the mole on his chin looked larger. The bags under his eyes seemed filled with black ink.

  “Ah,” the old man said. “My son-in-law has come to pay his respect.”

  Robert almost said, I am not your son-in-law, but he managed to keep his mouth shut and his face expressionless.

  Chou Luk made no effort to rise. The old man’s puffy eyes were half closed. From the length of his whiskers, it looked like he hadn’t shaved in days. His body had a rancid, sour odor. Robert wanted to ask if he bathed, but he knew this to be unacceptable and rude. Piety forbids criticizing elders. To do so, would only earn Ayaou’s anger. He didn’t want that. He wanted his stay to be pleasant.

  He recognized one of the girls. She’d been with the old man when Robert had fallen in love with Ayaou. Although he knew she had to be at least fifteen, she looked younger. He wondered who the other girl was. He didn’t think she was one of Ayaou’s sisters. He’d never seen her before.

  “I see you are well cared for,” Robert said, after nodding his head slightly. He didn’t offer his hand. He didn’t want to give this old man too much respect.

  Chou Luk gestured with his hands. “My wives,” he said. “I bought another wife a few months ago since the first one hasn’t given me a son.” Chou Luk spit on the deck and scowled. “Only two daughters—clean that up, girl,” he said to the first wife. “Daughters are useless. All they do is eat and cost money. I was going to stuff them in a sack filled with rocks and toss them in the river, but she cried and begged. She said if I got rid of them, I wouldn’t have them to help feed and clean me when I can’t leave my bed any longer.”

  Robert hid the revulsion he felt. He knew that in China women had little or no value. Instead, he said, “Your business must have been profitable to be able to acquire a second wife.” The thought of these two young girls with this old man sickened him.

  “No, business has been bad. Ayaou gave me the money. She said two wives would take care of me better than one and provide double happiness and double the chance of a son to carry on the family name.”