CHAPTER 74
Lady Wang authorizes a raid
on Prospect Garden
And Jia Xi-chun breaks off relations
with Ning-guo House
Patience was greatly amused by the tone of Ying-chun’s answer to her inquiry. Ying-chun’s further self-justification in reply to Dai-yu’s comment was cut short by the arrival of another visitor. It was at this point that we concluded the last chapter.
The visitor was Bao-yu. When it was known that one of the chief organizers of the gambling was Cook Liu’s younger sister, Cook Liu’s enemies in the Garden regarded this as a good opportunity for making another attempt to oust her from her kitchen. Going in a body to Xi-feng, they accused her of being in partnership with her sister and receiving equal shares of her takings, and they demanded that Xi-feng should take appropriate action to punish her. Cook Liu, when she heard this, was at first panic-stricken; then, remembering her friends at Green Delights, she hurried over there, taking great care that nobody saw her on the way, and begged Skybright and Aventurin to tell Bao-yu what had happened. It occurred to Bao-yu, when they told him, that as Ying-chun’s nurse was in trouble for the same offence, it would be more effective to join forces with Ying-chun in pleading for clemency than to go along on his own and plead only for Cook Liu. It was in order to discuss this matter that he had come to see Ying-chun. Unfortunately, when he arrived, he found that she was not alone.
‘Are you better now?’ the others asked him. (They supposed that he was still suffering from shock.) ‘What have you come for?’
He could not state the real purpose of his visit in front of so many people and merely told them that he had come ‘to see how Ying-chun was getting on’. The others believed him, and a desultory conversation followed about nothing in particular.
Patience now went off to deal with the pearl-and-gold phoenix. Zhu-er’s wife followed at her elbow, begging to be let off.
‘For charity’s sake, don’t tell her, miss! I promise you faithfully, that phoenix will be redeemed.’
‘So you keep saying,’ said Patience, drily. ‘What a pity you couldn’t have redeemed it a bit sooner and saved yourself this trouble! You want to wriggle out of this somehow without telling her, don’t you? Well, I can’t say that I am very keen on informing against you, myself. I’ll tell you what: you get that thing back as quickly as possible and hand it over to me, and I won’t say anything about it to my mistress.’
Zhu-er’s wife was so relieved that she went down on her knees to thank her.
‘You carry on now with whatever you are doing, miss. I’ll have it ready for you by this evening. I’ll bring it to show you as soon as I’ve redeemed it, and then I’ll take it back to Miss Ying’s. How will that be?’
‘All right,’ said Patience. ‘But if you don’t turn up with it this evening, you will have only yourself to blame for what happens.’
The two young women then went their separate ways.
‘Well?’ said Xi-feng, when Patience got back to her apartment. ‘What did Miss Tan want you for?’
‘She was worried that you might have been fretting over this gambling business,’ said Patience, smiling. ‘She asked me how you’d been eating this last day or two.’
‘That’s very kind of her,’ said Xi-feng. ‘Oh, there’s more trouble, by the way. Some of them have just been here accusing Cook Liu of being mixed up in the gambling business with her sister. They’re saying, in fact, that she was the real or?ganizer. However, remembering how insistent you always are that I should let well alone and only think of my health, I took no action. Last time I ignored your advice and had some?one punished, I not only offended Lady Xing but also ended up by making myself ill. So this time I knew better. They can do as they please, I don’t care. Someone else can do the worrying. I have nearly destroyed myself by worrying and the only result of it is that everyone hates me. Very well. Now all I am going to think about is getting better. And when I am better, I am going to turn myself into a Mr Yes-yes. No matter what frightful things the others get up to, I shall just say “Yes, yes” when I hear about them. “Yes, yes,” I shall say, and not give them a single other thought!’
‘If only you would be like that,’ said Patience smiling, ‘what a blessing it would be for us all!’
At that moment Jia Lian came in, sighing and striking his hands together with vexation.
‘More trouble! When I borrowed that stuff from Faithful the other day to pawn, how could Mother have got to hear about it? She had me over there just now and asked me to borrow two hundred taels for her. She said she wanted it for the Mid-Autumn festival. I said I didn’t know who I could borrow two hundred taels from at the moment. “If you can’t borrow the money, you can easily find something to raise it on,” she said. “Don’t always make excuses. Don’t know who to borrow it from, indeed! You could spirit all those things out of Lady Jia’s room when you chose to, yet now you make difficulties about raising a paltry two hundred taels for me! You’re lucky I haven’t told anyone what you’ve been up to.” I’m certain Mother isn’t really short of money. This is sheer, gratuitous trouble-making on her part.’
‘There were no outsiders here on that occasion,’ said Xi-feng. ‘I wonder how the news could have leaked out.’
Patience, who had been listening to their conversation, tried hard to remember who had been present. After some moments it came back to her.
‘I know. There was no one else here that day while you were talking to Faithful, but in the evening, when she sent the stuff round, that mother of Simple’s who works for Her Old Ladyship called in with some laundry and afterwards sat quite a long while talking in the kitchen. If she saw that great trunk there, it would have been only natural to ask what was inside it, and the maids might well have told her, without realizing that they were not supposed to. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if that’s how it got about.’
She called some of the junior maids in to question them.
‘Which of you told Simple’s mother the other day what was in that trunk?’
The maids knelt down in terror and swore by the most sacred oaths that they had said nothing.
‘We’re always most careful not to say too much to anyone. When people ask us anything, we always say that we don’t know. We’d certainly never have told her about that!’
Xi-feng considered the probabilities.
‘Somehow I don’t think they would have told her. At all events, there is no point in harrving them about it now. We shall just have to put that question behind us. The important thing now is to make sure that Mother gets what she wants. I’d rather we went short ourselves than risk her making another lot of trouble.’ She turned to Patience. ‘Take some of my gold things again and get us another two hundred taels. – As soon as she has the money ready, you can take it to Mother immediately, and that should be the end of the matter,’ she told Jia Lian.
‘Might as well raise four hundred taels while you are about it,’ said Jia Lian. ‘We could do with another two hundred ourselves.’
‘I don’t see that at all,’ said Xi-feng. ‘We don’t really need two hundred taels ourselves. And in any case, if we raise so much now, where is the money coming from later for getting the things out of pawn?’
Patience fetched the now familiar gold necklaces and told Brightie’s wife to take them to the pawnshop. Soon afterwards Brightie’s wife was back again with the cash and Jia Lian went in person to hand it over to his mother.
While Jia Lian was taking the money to Lady Xing, Xi-feng and Patience continued to ask themselves who could have leaked the information about the surreptitious removal of Grandmother Jia’s valuables.
‘It’s too bad!’ said Xi-feng. ‘Poor Faithful will be in trouble over this, and all because of us.’
While they were still wondering who it could have been, Lady Wang was announced. This was a surprise, for Xi-feng could think of no reason why she should be visiting them. She and Patience hurried out to greet her.
Lady Wang had only one maid, a trusted junior, in attendance. There was an angry expression on her face and she walked swiftly through the house into the inner room and sat down grimly on the kang, all without uttering a word. Xi-feng, concealing her apprehension behind a smile, hurriedly served her with tea.
‘It’s an unusual honour to have you here, Aunt.’
‘Patience, leave the room!’ Lady Wang commanded.
‘Yes’m,’ said Patience, wondering what on earth could be the matter, and hurried out, taking all the other maids with her. She stood by the outer door until they were all outside, then closed it after her and sat down at the top of the steps to prevent anyone going in.
As Xi-feng, now thoroughly alarmed, watched her aunt and wondered why she had come, Lady Wang, who appeared to be on the point of weeping, drew an embroidered pouch from her sleeve and threw it on the kang.
‘Look at that!’
Xi-feng hastily picked it up and found herself, to her great surprise, looking at a lewd picture, beautifully embroidered in silks.
‘Where did you get it from?’ she asked.
The tears that had collected in Lady Wang’s eyes poured down her cheeks now and the voice in which she answered was choked and trembling.
‘Where did I get it from? I sit all day at the bottom of a well. As you seemed such a conscientious young woman, I thought I could leave things to you and enjoy some leisure, but it seems that you are no better at managing than I. Fancy leaving a thing like that in the Garden – on a rockery, too, in broad daylight, where everyone could see it! It was picked up by one of Grandmother’s maids. If your mother-in-law hadn’t fortunately spotted the girl carrying it, it would have gone straight to Grandmother. I think it’s for you to tell me how it came to be dropped there.’
It was Xi-feng’s turn to look angry.
‘How do you know it’s mine?’
Lady Wang sighed and shed a few more tears.
‘How can you ask me that? Who in this household apart from you and Lian could a thing like this belong to? The old women would have no use for a thing like this and none of the girls would know where to get one from. Obviously that wretched, worthless Lian must have got hold of it from somewhere; and you, treating it, I suppose, as a great joke, were only too happy to receive it from him. I know that young couples do go in for this sort of thing; why try to deny it? But the young people in the Garden are still innocent. Suppose one of their maids had picked it up and shown it to them? It doesn’t bear thinking of. Or suppose a maid had picked it up and told someone from outside that she had found it in the Garden? What sort of reputation would that leave our family with? It would be better to die than that such a thing should happen.’
A mixture of shame and exasperation caused the blood to rush into Xi-feng’s face. She fell on her knees beside the kang. There were tears in her own eyes when she answered, but they were tears of anger.
‘What you say is no doubt very reasonable, Aunt, and I have no wish to argue with you, but I really don’t own anything like this and I really must ask you to reconsider one or two of the things you have said. First of all, take another look at this bag. It wasn’t made here. One can see at a glance that it is a poor commercial imitation of “palace” embroidery. Even the tassels are the kind you would buy outside. I may be young and frivolous, but I’d hardly be likely to want a trashy thing like this. Secondly, this isn’t the sort of thing one would carry around with one. Even if it were mine, I should keep it hidden somewhere in a secret place, not walk around with it on my person, particularly if I were going into the Garden. The girls and I are always holding each other and pulling each other about, so that if I were wearing a thing like this, it would very quickly get noticed, and what should I feel like then, if one of the girls or one of the maids were to look at it? Thirdly, I may be the only young married woman with a husband in the family, but there are plenty of even younger married women among the servants who are often in and out of the Garden. How can you be so sure that it wasn’t one of them who dropped this bag? Then there are those younger concubines of Sir She’s, like Carmine and Azure. Mother often takes one or two of them with her when she goes into the Garden. They would be even more likely to own a thing like this. And Zhen’s wife herself isn’t all that old, not to mention Lovey and Dove, whom she frequently takes with her when she goes there. How do you know it doesn’t belong to one of them? And in any case, there are so many maids in the Garden, how can you be so sure that all of them are pure? There may be one or two of the older ones who are not so innocent. One of them could have slipped out on some pretext or other when no one was looking to flirt with the pages on the inner gate and got it from one of them. It’s perfectly possible. But I can assure you that I have never possessed a thing like this, and I know that Patience hasn’t either. So I really must ask you to reconsider.’
Lady Wang was somewhat overwhelmed by this torrent of words, but had to admit their reasonableness.
‘You can get up,’ she said with a sigh. ‘It was wrong of me to accuse you. I ought to have known that a young woman of your breeding would not be guilty of such unseemliness. I am afraid I was overwrought and allowed anger to get the better of me. But what am I to do? Your mother-in-law saw fit to send this thing round to me by a messenger. I was terribly upset when I unwrapped it and saw what it was.’
‘The first thing to do is to try not to be so upset,’ said Xi-feng. ‘If the servants become aware that something is wrong, the chances of Grandmother getting to hear about it will be much greater. If we can remain cool and carry out our investigations in secret, we are much more likely to get at the truth, and even if we don’t, no one outside is going to be any the wiser. We should pick four or five of our most trusted servants to do the investigating – people like Zhou Rui’s wife and Brightie’s wife who can be relied upon not to talk – and send them into the Garden as replacements of the women who have been dismissed. The pretext for their investigations can be that there are various things connected with the gambling that still remain to be cleared up. The other thing we must do something about is the number of the maids. There are far too many of them. As they get older, they begin to get grown-up ideas, and one can never be quite sure that they may not get up to some mischief. It’s no good waiting until something has actually happened before doing any?thing, because then it will already be too late; on the other hand to begin large-scale dismissals straight away would be very distressing for the girls and probably for us as well. It would be better to wait until each maid either reaches a certain age or shows signs of growing insubordinate, and then use the first slip she makes as grounds for dismissing her and marrying her to one of the boys. In that way we can both avoid having trouble and at the same time make a considerable reduction in our expenses.’
Lady Wang sighed.
‘You are of course right. But in fairness to our girls I think it must be said that they are already making do with the absolute minimum of service. Not one of them has more than two or three maids who are the least bit of use. The others are like a pack of mischievous children. And I am not the only one who would feel unhappy about cutting down the numbers; I think it highly probable that Grandmother, too, would object. After all, things may be a bit difficult at present, but we can’t be all that poor. I wouldn’t lay claim to any great riches, but I think I may perhaps be a little bit better off than the rest of you. So if there is any talk of economy, I’d rather do without my?self than see the girls suffer. The important thing now is to call in Zhou Rui’s wife and one or two of our other women and get them to begin these secret investigations for us as quickly as possible.’
Xi-feng at once called Patience in and explained what was wanted. Patience went out again and within a short time had assembled five of Lady Wang’s and Xi-feng’s most trusted retainers: Zhou Rui’s wife, Wu Xing’s wife and Zheng Hua’s wife from among Lady Wang’s servants and Brightie’s wife and Happy’s wife from among Xi-feng’s. Lady Wang thought they might not be enough for the sort of detailed investigation she had in mind. While she was wondering who else to get, Wang Shan-bao’s wife walked in.
Wang Shan-bao’s wife, like Goody Fei, was one of the servants who had been with Lady Xing since her childhood and accompanied her when she came to the Jia household as a bride. It was she, in fact, who had brought the embroidered bag to Lady Wang, and she had trailed along to Xi-feng’s place out of curiosity, to see what she would do about the discovery. Lady Wang’s past observation of these trusted henchwomen of her sister-in-law had not been sufficient to make her mistrust them and she welcomed this new arrival as a reinforcement.
‘Ah, just the person!’ she said as she caught sight of her. ‘After you have reported back to your mistress, you will be able to go with these others into the Garden and keep an eye on them for me.’
On a number of past visits to the Garden Wang Shan-bao’s wife had been greatly put out by the failure of the maids there to show her the respect and consideration that she felt to be her due; but dearly as she would have liked to teach those young creatures a lesson, she had not so far found a sufficient pretext for doing so. This discovery of an obscene object in the Garden was, in her eyes, a godsend, and her recruitment by Lady Wang to play a part in the investigations arising out of it was the kind of opportunity she had dreamed of.
‘We’ll get to the bottom of this easy enough, don’t you worry, madam,’ she said. ‘What you need in that Garden is more discipline, if you don’t mind my saying so, and has been for some time. To see the way those young maids carry on there, you would think they were princesses. They can have that whole place in an uproar, yet none of us dares to breathe a word against them, for we know that if we did, they would go running off to their young mistresses and get them to complain that it’s them we have been criticizing: and that is a charge which none of us is willing to stand up to.’
Lady Wang nodded.
‘Yes, I suppose the girls who wait on the young mistresses are inclined to be a bit spoiled.’
‘The young mistresses’ maids are by no means the worst,’ said Wang Shan-bao’s wife. ‘The worst of the lot is that Skybright that works in Bao-yu’s room. Because she’s a bit better-looking than the others and a bit readier with her tongue, she goes around dolled up all the time like a Xi-shi, putting everyone else in their place. She likes the sound of her own voice, does that young woman, and she likes to have her own way. If you say the slightest little thing to offend her, up fly her eyebrows and she will begin telling you exactly what she thinks of you. Oh, she’s a proper little madam, that one! Not much of the maidservant about her!’
A sudden recollection seemed to strike Lady Wang while Wang Shan-bao’s wife was speaking. She turned to Xi-feng questioningly.
‘I remember last time I was in the Garden with Lady Jia seeing a maid, a snaky-waisted girl with narrow, sloping shoulders and something of your Cousin Lin about the eyes, shouting at one of the junior maids, and thinking what a thoroughly objectionable young woman she must be. I didn’t say anything at the time because I was with Lady Jia. I meant to try and find out who she was afterwards, but I forgot. I wonder if this is the same girl? It sounds uncommonly like her.’
‘Skybright is certainly the best-looking of the maids,’ said Xi-feng cautiously, ‘and as regards her behaviour and manner of speaking, I suppose you could say she is inclined to be a little too free. The person you describe certainly sounds as if it might have been her, but as I wasn’t myself there at the time, I wouldn’t like to say for sure that it was.’
‘There’s no need to go on wondering,’ said Wang Shan?bao’s wife. ‘We can call her here this minute and Her Ladyship can see for herself whether it’s her or not.’
‘Whenever I see anyone from Bao-yu’s room, it’s always either Aroma or Musk,’ said Lady Wang. ‘Both of them are the kind of plain, simple girl I like. They would never send the kind of girl we are talking about to see me because they know that that is just the sort of creature I cannot abide. Oh dear! One can’t help wondering, when a thing like this happens: suppose Bao-yu were to be corrupted by a little harpy like that…?’
After some moments’ reflection, she called in her own maid from outside.
‘I want you to go over to Master Bao’s place and say that there is something I want to ask them about. Say that I would rather Aroma and Musk stayed behind to look after Bao-yu. There is a girl there called Skybright who is very intelligent. You can tell her to come. Say she is to come over with you straight away. You are not to say anything to her on the way here.’
‘Yes, my lady,’ said the maid, and hurried off to Green Delights.
When she arrived Skybright, who had recently been feeling far from well, was just getting up from a nap and was only half awake: but as the order said ‘Come at once’, she had to go with the maid as she was, with no time to make herself presentable. However, this did not unduly concern her. Knowing Lady Wang’s aversion to people of her type, she would normally have felt some nervousness about having to appear before her. On this occasion she took comfort from the fact that her indisposition over the last few days had caused her to neglect her appearance. Dowdiness would count in her favour.
Alas! When she arrived in Xi-feng’s room, Lady Wang took one look at this languid vision with its tousled hair, crooked hairpins and rumpled dress and felt all the anger she had just conquered rising up again inside her – particularly when she recognized this as being almost certainly the same girl as the one who had aroused her ire on that previous occasion a month before in the Garden.
‘Good gracious me!’ she exclaimed sarcastically. ‘What swooning Xi-shi have we here? For whose benefit do you go around in this extraordinary get-up? Don’t imagine I don’t know what your little game is, young lady! I may not have done anything about you yet, but I’ll have the skin off you one of these days! – Is Bao-yu any better?’
Though shaken by the unexpectedness of this onslaught, Skybright realized at once that someone must have been saying things about her. And although understandably angry, she managed to keep her head. She was too intelligent not to realize that the question about Bao-yu was a trap. She knelt to answer it.
‘I don’t often go into Bao-yu’s room, madam, or see much of him, so I am afraid I am not able to tell you. It’s Aroma and Musk who mostly wait on him. They would be able to give Your Ladyship an answer.’
‘Little liar!’ said Lady Wang. ‘You’ve got eyes in your head, haven’t you? What’s the good of employing you if you can’t even tell me whether he’s well or not?’
‘I used to be Her Old Ladyship’s maid,’ said Skybright. ‘She selected me for night duty in the outer room at Green Delights because she thought that, going to live in the big, empty Garden he might get frightened at night. I told Her Old Ladyship that I was too stupid to work for Bao-yu, but that only made her angry. She said, “I’m not asking you to wait on him personally. You don’t need to be clever for the job I’m asking you to do.” So after that I had to go. I don’t see him very often. He might call me in once or twice every ten days or so to ask me about something and I just answer him and go back to my work. His meals and all the personal service are looked after either by the older servants and nannies or by Aroma and Musk and Ripple. Whenever I’ve got time for it, I still have a lot of Her Old Ladyship’s sewing to do. I’m afraid I don’t pay much attention to what Bao-yu is doing. I will do so in future, if Your Ladyship wishes me to.’
Lady Wang was completely taken in.
‘Please don’t trouble yourself,’ she said hastily. ‘Holy Name! I’m only too happy to learn that you don’t see much of him. So you were given to him by Her Old Ladyship. I suppose in that case I shall have to see her first before I can dismiss you.’
She turned to Wang Shan-hao’s wife.
‘When you and the others go into the Garden, I want you to take particular care that this girl is kept well away from Bao-yu. Make sure that she doesn’t sleep in the same room. I shall be dealing with her in a few days’ time, when I have had a chance of speaking about her to Her Old Ladyship.’
As she turned again momentarily towards Skybright, her voice rose almost into a shout.
‘Get out of here! The sight of you standing there like a young trollop offends my eyes! Who gave you permission anyway to dress yourself up in that garish fashion?’
Skybright left the room, utterly crushed. She buried her face in her handkerchief as soon as she was outside the door and wept into it every step of the way back to Green Delights.
Meanwhile Lady Wang was telling Xi-feng how much she regretted her remissness in having allowed creatures like Skybright to inhabit the Garden for so long undisturbed.
‘I wish I had had the energy to keep a closer watch on things,’ she said. I never expected to find a young flibber?tigibbet like that in the Garden. And I suppose if there is one there like that, there are likely to be others like it as well.’
Xi-feng could see that Lady Wang was too incensed to reason with; and however much she might have said to the point, she would not in any case have dared to do so in front of Wang Shan-bao’s wife, who was one of her mother?-in-law’s principal informants and a most notorious stirrer-up of trouble. She merely lowered her head, therefore, and murmured assent.
It was Wang Shan-bao’s wife who spoke.
‘Don’t upset yourself, my lady. Leave all these little things to me. There’s a very easy way of getting to the bottom of this business. Tonight, when the Garden gates have been shut and there is no chance of word getting through inside, we’ll make a surprise visit and search all the maids’ rooms in each of the apartments. Whoever owned this thing we’re trying to find out about must have other things like it as well, so if we find anything like it in our search, we shall have found the owner.
‘That sounds like a good idea,’ said Lady Wang. ‘We shall never get anywhere unless we do something like that. – What do you think?’ she asked Xi-feng.
Xi-feng deemed it impolitic to disagree.
‘If you think it’s all right, Aunt, I should let her do it.
‘I do think it’s all right,’ said Lady Wang emphatically. ‘Unless we do it this way, we might spend a year investigating and still get nowhere.’
A raid was accordingly planned for that very evening. After dinner, when Grandmother Jia had retired for the night and the cousins had all returned to their apartments, Wang Shan-bao’s wife, having first asked Xi-feng to accompany her, led her little party into the Garden. After ordering all the side gates to be closed, she set about searching immediately, beginning with the room just inside the Garden gate which was used by the women of the night watch as a rendez-vous. Nothing of interest was discovered there except for a few candle-ends and a little leftover lamp-oil which someone had evidently put by to take home. However, Wang Shan-bao’s wife solemnly pronounced them to be stolen property: no one was to touch these things, she said, until Lady Wang had been informed and the appropriate steps had been taken. They proceeded to Green Delights, barring the courtyard gates after them as soon as they were inside.
Bao-yu was still worrying about Skybright when this party of women came bursting into his courtyard and, without a word of explanation, walked straight into the part of the house occupied by the maids. On going out to investigate he ran into Xi-feng and asked her what was happening. Xi-feng went indoors to sit down with him and accepted a cup of tea.
‘Something important is missing that no one will own up to having taken,’ she said. ‘It’s thought that one of the maids in the Garden might have stolen it, so they are searching everyone in order to clear the innocent ones of suspicion.’
While Xi-feng was explaining this to Bao-yu, Wang Shan-bao’s wife was proceeding with her search.
‘Whose are these trunks?’ she asked, and demanded that the owners should come forward and open them.
Aroma had suspected that some sort of trouble lay ahead when she saw the state that Skybright was in when she returned from her interview. The raid confirmed her premonition. Resignedly she set the other maids an example by opening her own trunks and boxes first. Nothing of interest was found in them. The searchers passed on. Each girl stood by her own things and opened them up as the searchers came to them. Finally only Skybright’s trunk remained.
‘Which girl’s is this?’ said Wang Shan-bao’s wife. ‘Why doesn’t she come forward and open it?’
Aroma was on the point of opening it herself when Skybright, who, to judge from the state her hair was in, had only just got out of bed, came rushing into the room, flung the lid open with a bang, picked the trunk up by its bottom, and emptied its contents on the floor. Wang Shan-bao’s wife blushed scarlet with embarrassment.
‘There’s no cause to be angry with me, miss,’ she said. ‘I’m not carrying this search out to please myself, I’m here on Her Ladyship’s orders. If you don’t want your things to be searched, you have only to say so and I shall tell Her Ladyship. There’s no need to carry on like this about it.’
At this Skybright’s wrath blazed up in fury. She pointed at the old woman’s face.
‘You say you are here on Her Ladyship’s orders. Well I’m here on Her Old Ladyship’s orders. Anyway, I thought I knew all the women who worked at Her Ladyship’s place and I’m sure I never saw a self-important, meddlesome old busy?body like you there before!’
Xi-feng, who had now rejoined them, was secretly delighted to see Wang Shan-bao’s wife getting the rough side of Skybright’s tongue, but because the woman was her mother-in-law’s favourite, she had to pretend that she was shocked, and shouted at Skybright to be silent. Wang Shan-bao’s wife looked angry and flustered and seemed on the point of re?torting; but Xi-feng restrained her.
‘All right, Mrs Wang, that will do. You don’t have to put yourself on the same level by arguing with the girl. You get on with your searching. We’ve got all the other places to go to yet, and if we delay too long, word will get round that we are coming and they will be prepared for us. If that happens and you don’t succeed in finding anything, I shan’t consider myself responsible.’
Though inwardly fuming, Wang Shan-bao’s wife was obliged to contain herself and spent the next minute or two rummaging tight-lipped among Skybright’s possessions. Having found nothing of importance, she then asked Xi-feng if they might go elsewhere.
‘Now have you looked really thoroughly?’ said Xi-feng. ‘You’re going to look pretty silly if you have to report back to Lady Wang tomorrow that you couldn’t find any?thing.’
‘We’ve been through everything,’ said one of the women. ‘There’s nothing here that there shouldn’t be. We did find one or two boy’s things, but they were the sort of things a quite small boy would use. Probably they belonged to Bao-yu when he was little. Anyway, they’re of no conse?quence.’
‘In that case we can be on our way,’ said Xi-feng, pleasantly. ‘On to the next place, then!’
Off they went without more ado. Xi-feng turned to Wang Shan-bao’s wife as they walked along for a word in her ear.
‘I’ve got a suggestion to make, but I don’t know whether you’ll agree to it or not. Can we confine this search to members of our own household? I don’t think we ought to search the maids in Miss Xue’s room.’
‘Oh, I quite agree,’ said Wang Shan-bao’s wife. ‘It would never do to go searching the rooms of our guests.’
Xi-feng nodded.
‘That’s what I thought’
They had by now reached the Naiad’s House. Dai-yu had already gone to bed when the arrival of all these people was announced. Unable to guess what they could have come for, she was on the point of getting up to ask when Xi-feng came into her room and begged her to stay in bed.
‘Go to sleep. We shall be gone again in a moment.’
She slipped out again after a few inconsequences and rejoined the others, who had already begun their searching. In the course of rummaging through the various trunks and boxes in Nightingale’s room they came across some old amulets whose period of effectiveness had long since expired and a set of two pouches and a fan-case designed for wearing on a belt. The fan-case had a fan in it, which they took out to examine. These were obviously masculine articles and had in fact been worn at one time by Bao-yu. Wang Shan-bao’s wife, congratulating herself on what she took to be a signifi?cant discovery, called Xi-feng over to witness it.
‘Look at these things, Mrs Lian! Now where would these have come from?’
Xi-feng smiled.
‘These would be old things of Bao-yu’s,’ she said. ‘He and the girls here have been seeing each other for years – since they were little children. Their Ladyships would probably remember having seen these things on him. You could always ask them, if you don’t believe me.’
Wang Shan-bao’s wife was at once all smiles.
‘If you recognize them, Mrs Lian, that’s good enough for me.’
‘There’s nothing here worth bothering about,’ said Xi-?feng. ‘I think we should leave these folk in peace and hurry on elsewhere.’
‘We’ve had so many other things where these came from and given so many in return that I can’t keep track of them,’ said Nightingale laughing. ‘I couldn’t for the life of me tell you when he gave us these.’
Xi-feng and Wang Shan-bao’s wife now conducted their little party to Tan-chun’s place. This time their arrival was anticipated. Someone had brought word of their coming, and Tan-chun, guessing that something serious must have happened to have provoked so ugly a reaction, was standing in the open doorway, surrounded by maids with lighted candles, waiting for the search party when it arrived.
‘Well?’ she asked, somewhat challengingly. ‘What do you want?’
Xi-feng smiled an emollient smile.
‘Something has been missing and they have been questioning everyone for several days now without being able to find out who took it. It’s thought that whoever is responsible for the theft might try to incriminate one of the maids. We are making this search more for the sake of clearing them than because we really suspect any of them of taking it.’
‘Naturally all my maids are thieves,’ said Tan-chun affably. ‘As a matter of fact, I am their principal fence. If you want to search, you’d better look at my cupboards and boxes first, because anything they steal is automatically handed over to me.’
She ordered the maids to open all her boxes. She also made them bring in her dressing-cases, jewel-boxes, bedding-rolls and miscellaneous wrapped-up bundles of clothing and open them all up for Xi-feng to inspect.
Xi-feng laughed uncomfortably.
‘I’m only carrying out your mother’s orders, coz. There’s no point in getting offended with me.’ She turned to the servants. ‘Quickly, do these things up again for Miss Tan.’
Scribe and Ebony, assisted by Patience and Felicity, began refastening the boxes and tying the bundles up again.
‘I’ve said that you may search my things,’ said Tan-chun, ‘but if you want to search my maids’, I’m afraid that won’t be possible. You see, I am a very hard mistress. I always insist on knowing what my maids have got; consequently everything they have – every needle and thread even – is taken care of by me; I don’t allow them to keep anything themselves. So if you want to do any searching, you will have to search me. If that doesn’t satisfy you, you have only to report to Lady Wang that I was obstructive and I will gladly face whatever the consequences are tomorrow. I must say, I cannot understand this eagerness to meet trouble half-way. The searching will begin soon enough in this household when the day of confiscation arrives. Didn’t you hear the news this morning about the Zhens? They tempted fate, just as we are now doing, by carrying out a quite unnecessary search of their own servants, and now there is a confiscation order against them and they are being searched themselves. No doubt our time too is coming, slowly but surely. A great household like ours is not destroyed in a day. “The beast with a thousand legs is a long time dying.” In order for the destruction to be complete, it has to begin from within.’
She began to cry. Xi-feng darted a look at the women, which Zhou Rui’s wife interpreted as a signal that they should go.
‘Since Miss Tan has said that the girls’ things are all here, Mrs Lian, can’t we go on to another place now and leave her in peace?’
Xi-feng responded by rising to her feet and wishing Tan?chun good night.
‘Are you sure you’ve looked properly?’ said Tan-chun. ‘It’s no good coming back tomorrow and asking to look again, because I shan’t let you.’
‘If all the maids’ things are in here, there is no need to look,’ said Xi-feng, smiling.
‘No need to look, when I’ve gone to the trouble of having everything opened for you?’ said Tan-chun coldly. ‘I call that rather perverse. Tomorrow I suppose you will say that I covered up for my maids and wouldn’t let you look. I want to be told in plain language that you have searched as much as you want to. If you haven’t, you’d better do so now, while you have the chance.’
Xi-feng smiled. She knew from past experience that she had to be more careful with Tan-chun than with any of the other girls.
‘I have already searched your maids’ things and your things sufficiently.’
‘And what about the rest of you?’ Tan-chun asked the women.
‘We’ve searched enough,’ said Zhou Rui’s wife and the other women, smiling.
It was now that Wang Shan-bao’s wife showed her total lack of judgement – for she was in truth a very stupid woman. She had heard something of Tan-chun’s reputation in the past, but refused to believe that an unmarried girl of her years – particularly one who was a concubine’s daughter -could be as formidable as Tan-chun was said to be. No doubt, she told herself, it was the inexperience or pusillanimity of her informants that made them think her so. Was not she, Wang Shan-bao’s wife, one of Lady Xing’s oldest and most trusted servants? Did not even Lady Wang have to show her a cer?tain measure of deference? A mere chit of a girl like Tan-chun was not going to intimidate her. She had, in any case, the distinct impression that it was Xi-feng and not herself that Tan-chun was angry with. At all events, she resolved to show how little she held Tan-chun in esteem by indulging in a little horse-play at her expense. Going up to Tan-chun, she took hold of a corner of her jacket and turned it back, grinning all over her face.
‘There!’ she said. ‘Now I’ve even searched Miss Tan, and there’s nothing on her either!’
Xi-feng was shocked.
‘Good gracious, woman! Are you -?’
But before she could finish there was a resounding smack! and a large red mark appeared on the old woman’s face where Tan-chun had hit her.
Tan-chun was in a towering rage.
‘Who do you think you are? How dare you touch me? It seems that the respect that I and the others show you, even though it is only for Her Ladyship’s sake and out of consideration for your age, merely encourages you to make mischief for us and abuse your borrowed powers. That, in all conscience, is hard enough to bear. But now, to lay hands on me – that is really too much! If you have reckoned on my being a poor, timid creature like your Miss Ying whom you can bully and impose upon at your pleasure, you have made a very big mistake. You may search my things if you wish and I shall not complain; but I will not be made a laughing-stock. Here!’ – with one hand she began feverishly undoing her buttons, while with the other she pulled Xi-feng’s hand towards her and placed it beneath her jacket ‘Search me! I would rather be searched by you than submit to being pawed over by a slave!’
Xi-feng and Patience quickly buttoned her up again and straightened out her dress, shouting angrily at Wang Shan?bao’s wife as they did so.
‘You have been drinking again, Nannie. Why do you do it, if it makes you behave so badly? You’d better get out of here, before worse happens!’
Patience did her best to comfort Tan-chun.
‘Dear miss! Please don’t distress yourself. She isn’t worth your getting upset about!’
Tan-chun gave a humourless laugh.
‘I’m not upset. If I’d been upset I should have beaten my brains out before I’d have let her touch me. I shall see Grandmother and Lady Wang about this first thing tomorrow, and after that I shall call on Lady Xing and make whatever amends she likes to ask for.’
Wang Shan-bao’s wife had retreated hastily from the room after her discomfiture and was now lurking outside the window complaining bitterly of the outrage to her dignity.
‘This is the first time anyone has ever struck me. I shall see Lady Xing tomorrow and ask her to let me go back to my old home. If this is the way I am to be treated, I had rather not go on living!’
‘Do you hear what that woman is saying?’ Tan-chun asked her maids. ‘Are you waiting for me to go out there and argue with her myself?’
Scribe, needing no second prompting, hurried outside to take up the cudgels for her mistress.
If I were in your shoes, Mrs Wang, I should have the sense to keep my mouth shut. We should all be only too pleased if you really did go back to your own home; but I’m afraid that when it comes to it, you won’t be able to tear yourself away. After all, if you go, who will there be left to worm her way into Her Ladyship’s confidence and make all our lives a misery by having searches made?’
Xi-feng was greatly amused.
‘Good for Scribe! “Like mistress, like maid”!’
‘Oh,’ said Tan-chun coldly, ‘we thieves have ready wits. We are all capable of turning a phrase or two. It’s only when it comes to going behind other people’s backs and stirring those in authority up against them that we are not quite so clever.’
Patience made some soothing remark to Tan-chun, simultaneously making a grab at Scribe and pulling her back into the room, while Zhou Rui’s wife and the other women did their best to be conciliatory. Xi-feng remained until she had seen Tan-chun safely put to bed before leading her party off in the direction of Xi-chun’s Spring in Winter room in the Lotus Pavilion, briefly taking in Li Wan’s place on the way.
As Li Wan was unwell and had already taken her medicine and settled down for the night by the time they arrived, they went into the maids’ room straight away without disturbing her. After searching each of the maids’ boxes in turn and finding nothing, they continued on their way to Xi-chun’s apartment.
Being younger and more immature than the other cousins, Xi-chun was much more frightened by this visitation and at first seemed to be quite bewildered by it. It took all of Xi?feng’s efforts to calm her. Unfortunately, while they were searching in Picture’s trunk, they came upon a large packet containing thirty or forty silver medallions, a carved jade belt-buckle, a pair of men’s boots and a pair of socks. Even Xi-feng turned pale.
‘Where did these come from?’ she asked the unhappy maid.
Picture knelt down and tearfully confessed the truth.
‘They were given to my brother by Mr Zhen, madam. Since our parents went to live in the South, our uncle and aunt have been looking after us. They both drink and gamble a lot, and my brother was afraid that if he left anything with them they would sell it and spend the money, so he made a secret arrangement with one of the old nannies to bring things in to me so that I could look after them for him.’
Xi-chun, a naturally timorous child, was terrified by this discovery.
‘I knew nothing about this!’ she cried. ‘It is very wicked of her. If you want to beat her, cousin, please do it outside. I’m not used to hearing such things. I think it would distress me.’
Xi-feng smiled.
‘If what you say is true,’ she told Picture, ‘you can be forgiven for looking after these things. But your brother had no business to choose such a way of getting them in to you. If these things could be smuggled in without anyone knowing, then so could anything else. It’s the person who brought them in who is the really guilty party. Of course, if what you say is not true, you may as well give up hope of living!’
‘I wouldn’t dare lie to you, madam,’ said Picture, weeping. ‘You have only to ask Mr and Mrs Zhen. If they say my brother wasn’t given these things, I shan’t complain if you beat us both to death.’
‘I shall certainly ask,’ said Xi-feng. ‘But even if he was given them, you are still to blame. Who said that you could have things brought in to you secretly? I shall let you off this once if you will tell me honestly who brought them in, but you mustn’t ever do this again.’
‘Don’t let her off!’ said Xi-chun. ‘There are so many maids. If the older ones see her getting away with it, there’s no knowing what they will get up to. You may want to forgive her, but I don’t.’
‘She seems to me a pretty sensible girl as a rule,’ said Xi?feng. ‘We all make mistakes sometimes. I’m only proposing that we should let her off this once. If she does anything like this again, we shall punish her for this offence as well. – Come on now, what about this person who brought you the things?’ she asked Picture. ‘Tell me who it was.’
‘Oh, I can tell you that,’ said Xi-chun. ‘It’s sure to have been that old Zhang woman from the rear gate. She’s always around here, whispering guiltily to the maids and doing little favours for them – in return for which, of course, they give her their protection.’
Xi-feng told one of the women to make a note of this. The silver and the other things she gave to Zhou Rui’s wife to take care of until Picture’s statement about their provenance could be verified.
This old Mamma Zhang whom Xi-chun had named as the go-between who had brought things in for Picture’s brother was a close kinswoman of Wang Shan-bao’s wife, being in fact the mother-in-law of one of her children. However, since becoming Lady Xing’s chief confidante, Wang Shan?bao’s wife had had little time for kinsfolk or former colleagues, and her treatment of Mamma Zhang had caused that matron to take umbrage. On two occasions there had been words between them, and for some time now the two of them had not been on speaking terms. The satisfaction of learning that the guilty bearer of these objects was a hated enemy almost compensated Wang Shan-bao’s wife for the indignity of being slapped by Tan-chun and taunted by Tan-chun’s maid. She endeavoured to impress Xi-feng with the gravity of what they had discovered.
‘This smuggling is a very serious business, Mrs Lian. No doubt the things we are looking for got into the Garden by the same way. I think you ought to look into this.’
‘I fully intend to do so,’ said Xi-feng. ‘I don’t need you to tell me.’
They took leave of Xi-chun then and made their way to Ying-chun’s. Ying-chun was asleep when they arrived and the maids had already gone to bed. They had to knock a long while at the gate before anyone answered.
‘There’s no need to disturb your mistress,’ Xi-feng said to the girl who admitted them, and made straight for the maids’ room, followed by the rest of the party. Knowing that Wang Shan-bao’s wife was Chess’s maternal grandmother, Xi-feng watched her very attentively to see if she would show any favouritism. Wang Shan-bao’s wife began on the trunks of the other maids. None of them contained anything of interest. Coming to Chess’s trunk last of all, she merely picked up one or two things lying on the top of it before hurriedly pronouncing that there was ‘nothing there’, and would have shut it up again if Zhou Rui’s wife had not intervened to prevent her.
‘Now just a minute. Whether there is or not, you’ve got to go through it properly, the same as you did the rest, out of fairness to the others.’
She stretched her own hand out as she said this and, diving into the trunk, fetched out, successively, a pair of men’s padded socks, a pair of men’s satin slippers, and a packet containing a little Loving Couple ornament and a letter. All these things she handed over to Xi-feng.
From handling so many bills, invoices and accounts during her years as a household manager, Xi-feng had learned to recognize quite a large number of characters and was able to make out the whole of the crude missive, written on pink Double Happiness notepaper, that Zhou Rui’s wife had just thrust into her hand.
Since your visit last month my parnts have fund out about us but cant do any thing til Miss Yings marrid if
you can meet me in the garden send word by mrs Zhang we can talk more frely in the garden than at home
PLEASE TRY I have recd the two rosearys I send you this bag it shows you what I dream of!! PLEASE
KEEP IT!!! your loving kit cousin PAN YOU?AN
Xi-feng could hardly restrain herself from laughing out loud.
Wang Shan-bao’s wife knew nothing of the romantic history that lay behind this letter; but she had already had an un?comfortable feeling that all was not well when she saw the men’s socks and shoes; and now, as she watched Xi-feng reading the words on the pink notepaper and laughing at what she read, she became even more apprehensive.
‘What is it, madam? An account?’ she said. ‘I suppose you are laughing because there is some mistake in it.’
‘It certainly doesn’t balance properly,’ said Xi-feng, laughing. ‘If you are Chess’s grandmother, shouldn’t her kit-cousin be a Wang?’
Wang Shan-bao’s wife found the question a very strange one.
‘She has a kit-cousin on her father’s side, her father’s sister’s son. Pan You-an, that boy who ran away – he’s her kit-cousin.’
‘That makes sense,’ said Xi-feng. ‘Would you like me to read you the letter?’
She proceeded to do so, to the great astonishment of all present. Wang Shan-bao’s wife, who had sought out the wrongdoing of others with such single-minded persistency, was now mortified to discover that the only wrongdoer she had succeeded in unmasking was her own granddaughter.
‘Did you hear that, Mrs Wang?’ said Zhou Rui’s wife, who, like the other women, had signalled her astonishment by sticking her tongue out and wagging her head incredu?lously. ‘Couldn’t be clearer than that, could it? No talking a way out of that one! So what do we do now?’
Wang Shan-bao’s wife heartily wished that it were possible to slip through some crack and disappear into the ground. Xi-feng contemplated her for some moments with enjoyment, her lips puckered up with suppressed laughter.
‘One must look on the bright side,’ she said to Zhou Rui’s wife. ‘The girl has quietly gone off and chosen herself a husband. At least her grandmother is saved the bother of choosing one for her!’
Zhou Rui’s wife laughed, and added some pleasantry of her own. Wang Shan-bao’s wife was left with no one but herself on whom to vent her anger, so she slapped her own face and reproached herself.
‘Silly old fool! You’ve lived too long, that’s your trouble! Look what you’ve brought on yourself! Why couldn’t you have kept your mouth shut? Now you’ve got to suffer for your own foolishness.’
The others had not the heart to laugh, but could not help feeling pleased, either because she had made them suffer in the past and it was sweet to see her suffer now in her turn, or from a more detached belief that they were witnessing the working-out of divine retribution on one who had richly deserved its visitation.
Xi-feng noticed with surprise that Chess, who all this time had been standing by with bowed head, saying nothing, had no trace of fear or shame in her expression and wondered if she might be planning to make away with herself. As it was obviously too late that night for questioning her, she deputed two of the women to watch over her until morning. She herself went off with the other women, taking the things with her as evidence.
It was her intention to deal with the matter in the morning, after a night’s sleep, but during the course of the night she was several times obliged to get out of bed, and each time she did so she found that she was losing blood. By the time next morning came, she was too weak and dizzy to get up. A doctor was called. He took her pulses, wrote a prescription, and left, saying that she would need to rest. His findings, reported to Lady Wang by the old nannies who went to have the prescription made up, plunged that already depressed gentlewoman into yet greater gloom. Thus judgement on Chess’s affair was, for the time being, postponed.
*
You-shi, as it happened, called in that day to see Xi-feng and sat for a while talking with her. After that she went on to see Li Wan and talked with her. While she was there, a maid arrived to ask if she would mind calling in to see Xi-chun, so she went along to Xi-chun’s. As soon as she arrived, Xi-chun launched into a long and detailed account of what had happened the previous night. She also sent someone round to ask Zhou Rui’s wife for the things that had been found in Picture’s trunk. You-shi verified that they had indeed been given by Cousin Then to Picture’s brother.
‘Stupid creature!’ she said, turning to rebuke Picture, who was standing by.
‘Why do you call her names?’ said Xi-chun. ‘It was your laxness which made her the way she is. It’s too bad. None of the other girls has been let down like this by her maids. How shall I be able to face them after this? I told Cousin Feng last night to take her away, but she wouldn’t. I am glad that you have come, because now you will be able to. I don’t care what you do with her – beat her, kill her, sell her – I just want to be rid of her.’
Picture knelt down and implored her mistress most piteously not to send her away. You-shi and Xi-chun’s nurses also did their best to talk Xi-chun out of dismissing her.
‘It was only a single lapse on her part,’ said You-shi. ‘I’m sure she won’t do it again. Think of all the years of service she has given you.’
But Xi-chun, in whom the natural waywardness of youth was reinforced by a perverse contrariness that was all her own, remained adamant in the face of both argument and entreaty and insisted that Picture must go.
‘And it isn’t only Picture that I don’t want to see any more,’ she told You-shi. ‘The same goes for all the rest of you. From now on I propose to stop going round to your place altogether. There has been a lot of talk about you people of late. If I continue to go round, I am afraid I might get involved in it.
‘Who has been talking about us?’ said You-shi. ‘And what, pray, have they found to talk about? I think you might begin by considering who you are – and who we are. If you have heard people talking about us, I should have thought it was up to you to ask them what they meant by it.’
‘That’s rather strange advice coming from you,’ said Xi-chun sneeringly. ‘A girl like me is supposed to keep well away from scandal, not go running headlong towards it. You know the saying: “A father should help a son and the son his father, but not in slaying or in doing evil.” The same principle holds good for you and me. I can only answer for my own integrity. If you people end up by getting yourselves into a mess, I don’t want to have anything to do with it.
You-shi was half angered and half amused by her young sister-in-law’s rudeness.
‘I can see now why people speak of Miss Xi as young for her age,’ she said, addressing the grown-up servants below the kang. “‘Young and foolish” I have heard her called. I used not to believe it of her, but finding her now so unreason?able and so lacking in any sense of proportion, I really do begin to despair of her.’
‘She is still very young,’ said the women placatingly. ‘You must expect a few knocks in your dealings with her, Mrs Zhen.’
‘I may be “young”,’ said Xi-chun scornfully, ‘but there is nothing “young” about what I have just been saying. And since none of you people can even read or write, how can you have the nerve to call me “foolish”?’
‘You are the great scholar, of course,’ said You-shi sarcastic?ally, ‘the Top of the List candidate! Stupid people like us cannot hope to compete with you in understanding.’
‘There’s certainly not much understanding in what you have just said,’ Xi-chun retorted. ‘Your assumption that a Top of the List candidate cannot be stupid is a vulgar fallacy typical of the great mass of blind, undiscriminating world?lings. A true sage can be identified by the very first step he takes, not by examination results.’
‘Goodness!’ said You-shi mockingly. ‘A moment ago we had the great scholar; now, it seems, the great preacher has come to enlighten us!’
‘I lay no claim to enlightenment,’ said Xi-chun, ‘though I can see that most people are no better than Picture – and that they are as little worth bothering about.’
‘You are a cold-hearted little monster,’ said You-shi.
‘If I seem cold, it is because I wish to keep myself uncorrupted,’ said Xi-chun. ‘Why should I want to get involved with you and allow myself to be dragged down to your level?’
You-shi was highly sensitive to remarks about her family’s reputation and had already been embarrassed and upset by Xi-chun’s reference to ‘people talking’. Because Xi-chun was only a girl, she had done her best not to lose her temper; but this last remark was too much to stomach. Unable to contain herself any longer, she burst out angrily.
‘What do you mean, “dragged down to my level”? You turn your maid’s offence into an occasion for making a completely unwarranted attack upon me, and when I bear your ridiculous attacks with patience, it seems merely to encourage you to indulge in further insults. Very well, Miss Holy Purity! I shall be careful to keep away from you in future, in case your priceless reputation is sullied by my presence.’
She swept out angrily, indicating to her maids as she went that they should bring Picture with them.
‘It will be much better for all concerned if you don’t ever come here again,’ Xi-chun called out after her. ‘It will save a lot of argument.’
You-shi heard this and grew even angrier; but reflecting that Xi-chun was, however vexing, a young unmarried daughter of the family and therefore not a person with whom she could engage in open wrangling, she swallowed her anger and hur?ried off without answering, out of the Garden and into the inner part of the mansion.
What she heard there will be related in the chapter which follows.
