Mulberry and Peach (12 page)

Chia-kang says, ‘Well, I'm not going to run away. In the last war we fought the Japanese. If you saw a short “devil” you could tell it was Japanese. But now it's Chinese fighting Chinese. You can't tell the people from the “devils”. They are all devils. There are devils everywhere.'

Mr Cheng chuckes ironically. ‘Escape today, add one more day to your life. We've sold everything. And already bought plane tickets. We'll first go to Nanking, then on to Shanghai and Canton, and if we have to, we'll go to Taiwan as a last resort.' He continues to chat about ‘meeting again sometime in the future' and other polite topics of conversation. Finally he asks Aunt Shen if we could keep a trunk of antiques and a trunk of scrolls for him, all priceless heirlooms.

Aunt Shen, lying on the
k'ang,
waves her hand. ‘Do us a favour, Mr Cheng. Get those things out of here as quickly as possible. When the Eighth Army comes, they'll think they are ours. We have a roomful of our own furniture, furs and antiques that we haven't thrown out yet.'

A loud cracking noise comes from the courtyard.

Mr Cheng laughs. ‘Don't worry. The students in the south section of the house are helping out. They're chopping up your furniture for firewood.'

 

Explosions.

The city gates are closed.

All connections with the outside world have been cut off: railroads, telephone lines, air routes.

 

‘... Those of you living in the areas controlled by Chiang Kai-shek, please listen carefully: The Chinese People's Liberation Army is about to liberate the whole country. Please don't try to flee. Please remain where you are and take all steps necessary to protect people's lives, property, buildings and provisions. Please don't try to flee. Wherever you go, the People's Liberation Army will follow. The Liao-Shen
campaign has already ended victoriously. The Huai-Hai campaign is in the last, decisive stages of victory. The People's Liberation Army is ready to cross the Yangtze River. The Peking-Tientsin campaign is in the last decisive stages of victory: The People's Liberation Army has already completely cut off and surrounded enemy forces in Peking, Tientsin, Chang-chia-k'ou, Hsin Pao-an, and T‘ang-ku, five isolated areas, and cut off the enemy's escape south and west . . .'

‘...
As she listened, the ghost became afraid. Most honoured King of Hell, please listen to my plea.
It
was my parents' cruel hearts, they should not have sold me to the land of mist and flowers. At twelve or thirteen I learned to sing and play the zither. At fourteen or fifteen I began receiving men. Chang San comes when he wants me; Li Ssu comes when he wants me. The money
I
earned went to make the old Procuress happy.
Yee-hsia!
If I didn't earn money, she would beat me and whip me.
Yee-hsia-hsia! . . .'

‘... the Communist rebels, unconcerned about the lives and property of the people in Peking, have been savagely bombing Peking since December thirteenth. Commander-in-Chief of the Extermination Campaign Against the Communist Rebels in North China, Fu Tso-i, has announced that he has utmost confidence in wiping out the rebels. He will fight to the finish. The six hundred thousand troops under Fu Tso-i's command have already undertaken rapid measures to protect Peking and Tientsin. Several thousand workers are working around the clock to construct temporary landing strips at Tung-tan and the Temple of Heaven. The cypress groves at the Temple of Heaven have been completely uprooted....'

‘I, the commander, am mounted on my horse, and I am busy looking for signs of movement. Chu-ko Liang sits drinking in the watchtower playing his lute. Two servants are at his side. The old, worn-out soldiers are cleaning the street. I should send down the order to take the city. Kill, kill, but no. . . . '
Chia-kang keeps moving the radio dial back and forth.

The radio blares all day long in the parlour. Chia-kang and I sit by the radio for hours, and listen to the news of the war. The radio is our only connection with the outside world.

 

Shells whiz above the courtyard.

‘Hey, why don't we take over those rooms,' the students are shouting in the courtyard. ‘The east wing is empty. There's no one living there now.'

‘You students, you have no respect for the law,' shouts Chia-kang from the doorway. ‘You took over the south section and now you want the east wing. The government has declared that anyone taking over residences by force will be severely punished!'

‘Listen, there are more than two hundred thousand troops in Peking. Three or four hundred prisoners have just been released. The days that one family can occupy a whole house are over!'

‘You rebels! The east wing has already been rented to a family from the South. They should arrive any day now.'

‘I'm sorry, but from now on no one can get in or get out of this city.'

‘Hey, what are you doing with those trunks? They belong to the Chengs. Hey, there are valuable things in those trunks ...'

‘Sorry, mister, it's cold and we need a fire.'

The students begin carrying their belongings into the east wing.

Broken antiques and torn scrolls litter the courtyard; a shredded picture of the Yangtze River, a cracked bamboo brush holder, a green gourd shaped vase split in half. Bits and shreds of mud-splattered scrolls, calligraphy copybooks, and classical texts are strewn everywhere. The only thing intact is a statue of the folk hero, The Foolish Old Man Who Moved the Mountain, lying in the corner of the courtyard. The Foolish Old Man is wearing a yellow robe and straw sandals. There's a pack lashed to his waist. He is holding a black axe in his right hand and with his left hand he strokes his long white beard. A boy, dressed in a white robe, blue pants and red smock, stands at his side, shouldering a yellow basket. The old man and the boy are standing on a cliff looking up.

The artillery booms. There's an explosion and the main gate blows open. Wind and sand whirl in around us.

Scraps of the Yangtze River flutter in the courtyard.

 

The Shens are dismissing Amah Ch'ien. They give her three months' wages. Amah Ch'ien mentions her mistress's jewelry. Aunt Shen gives her a gold bracelet. Amah Ch'ien continues: She is old, the mistress has suddenly dismissed her. Where is she supposed to go? She has waited on the same mistress for twenty years, and although she may not have been an exceptional servant, she did work hard. She deserves something more. In addition she is given a sheepskin jacket.

Amah Ch'ien leaves, the students take over the west wing. To celebrate, they kill another dog in the courtyard.

‘Chia-kang, it's dark all of a sudden. Light the lamp.'

‘There's no oil, Mother.'

‘Well, then let's sit together and wait until it gets light outside.'

‘Mother, are you better today?'

‘I get worse every day.'

‘Auntie, let me massage your legs.'

‘All right, Mulberry, massage my legs. Chia-kang, come sit on the
k'ang
with me. It'll be warmer if the three of us crowd together.'

‘OK.'

‘Chia-kang, the jewelry box is beside my pillow. I want to go through it and put my jewelry in order, then you can bury the box under the floor boards.'

‘Mother, can you find everything in the dark?'

‘Eh. Right now I'm feeling the brocade pouch.'

‘You mean the black, blue and pink brocade one? Don't forget the belt braided with blue and pink silk floss.'

‘That's right, Chia-kang, you remember it exactly. All my prize possessions are in this pouch. Now I can feel the gold locket.'

‘Mulberry, you've got to see how Mother looks in the photograph inside the locket.'

‘Too bad we don't have any electricity.'

‘You don't need light to see it, Mulberry. I can describe it for you. Mother had her hair in a chignon, with a magnolia flower tucked in it, bangs on her forehead. She is wearing a black satin dress with bell sleeves, a high mandarin collar, and high slits on the sides, a white silk scarf and gold-rimmed glasses. She is holding a deluxe edition of a foreign book and she is posing by a small bridge over a stream, standing with one foot on tip-toe as if she is about to take a step, but can't.'

‘Chia-kang, you remember so clearly how I looked. The next thing will be more difficult to guess. Guess what I'm holding in my hand now?'

‘The jade bracelet?'

‘You're wrong. It's the jade Buddha that you played with when you were one year old. I bought it at the market outside Hartman city gate. I sewed it to your hat and you wore it for a picture. In the picture you were naked, sitting on a prayer mat, and giggling like a little laughing Buddha.'

‘Mulberry, why are you so silent?'

‘I'm looking and listening, Chia-kang.'

‘It's so dark you can't even see your own hand. What can you see?'

‘I can see everything you and Auntie are describing.'

‘Chia-kang, now I'm holding the white jade bracelet. In the spring of 1933, there was a festival at the Shrine of the Fire God. There were many pearl and jade stalls set up there. I saw this white jade bracelet at the jade stall there. A lot of things happened that year. Your grandmother died, your grandfather died. Phoenix, your father's concubine, had a miscarriage and died. At that time we still had two maids, Ch'un-hsiang and Ch'un-hsia.'

‘Mother, does Chia-ch'ing know he is Phoenix's son?'

‘How could he not know? He just pretends not to know because Phoenix was a maid. Chia-ch'ing ran away from home in the summer of ‘39. Some people said he went to Yen-an to join the Communists. If he comes back with the Eighth Army, we'll have a little protection.'

‘Mother, Father is dead. You aren't his real mother. I'm afraid he might cause trouble for us.'

‘It's not my fault his mother died.'

‘That's not what I mean. I mean, he might come and carry on about class struggle and throw people out of their home and things like that.'

‘Live each day as it comes, Chia-kang, don't talk about troubling things. Mulberry, can you see this wedding crown in my hand?'

‘I can't see anything but a black shadow.'

‘It's a red phoenix with two little black pearl eyes, wings outstretched with a string of red tassels in its tiny pointed beak. When I was carried into the Shen's house on a flower-decked brocade sedan-chair, I was wearing this crown and a pink silk cloak.'

‘Mother, what about the jade frog ring?'

‘It's in here somewhere. Here, I've found it. This was part of my dowry.'

‘Auntie, your whole youth is in that pouch.'

‘You're absolutely right, Mulberry. What I'm touching are the most splendid days of my life. Now I'm just an old, broken kite, unable to fly.'

‘Mother, we ought to bury this jewelry immediately. I've been thinking, that jade frog ring . . .'

‘Chia-kang, the fire is going out. Go and try to find a little coal.'

‘All right.'

‘Mulberry, don't massage me anymore. Just sit and talk to me. The whole country is fighting and here you are in Peking. You don't know how happy that makes me. When I saw you in Nanking, such a tiny little thing, I loved you so much. I said to your mother, “Let's hope our two families will be united in marriage.” That's why I gave you
that little gold chain. After all these years of war and fighting, you and Chia-kang are together again. Everything is decided by fate. I'm old now. I'm anxious to get a daughter-in-law and hold a grandson in my arms. There's only Chia-kang left in this branch of the family. Chia-ch'ing has become a Communist. He doesn't count any longer as a Shen family heir. Chia-kang told me he wants to marry you immediately. No one knows a son like his mother. I have something I have to make clear to you. My Chia-kang is happy with his life, a loyal and generous person, but he has been spoiled. He has never had to struggle. If you marry him, you've got to give in to him in certain ways. He has only one fault, the same as his father. He likes to play around with girls. The best maids I had were ruined by his father. Later I bought this idiot maid, Joy. I had to be careful about the father and then I had to watch the son. It was like a mute taking medicine, can't even say it's bitter. Do you know why Hsing-hsing comes to visit so often?'

‘I know. I realised that a long time ago.'

‘That young girl is all right, but she is just fickle. When Chia-ch'ing was at home, she led him on. Now she and Chia-kang are having an affair. Did you know that?'

‘Why doesn't he marry her?'

‘Because I don't approve. There are only two sons in our family, if there were three, four, five, six or seven, she could have all the others. I'm telling you this so you'll be prepared. If you marry Chia-kang and he behaves himself, you're lucky. If he doesn't, you'll be prepared for it and it won't be so bad. I know what that kind of bitterness is like. It happened to me. I . . .'

‘Mother, we don't have much coal left.' Chia-kang comes into the room.

‘Don't waste it then. We don't know how long this siege is going to last. Chia-kang, I was just talking to Mulberry about the two of you getting married.'

‘Mulberry, let's get married on New Year's. Today is the twentieth of the twelfth lunar month. Oh, no, wait a minute, we can't get married on New Year's. Ever since the city has been surrounded, there have been more and more wedding announcements in the paper. Everyone gets married on New Year's. There probably won't be an empty banquet hall we could rent. Let's get married on New Year's Eve. The sooner the better. Mother, do you think that's all right?'