The Warning Voice (31 page)

‘Why don't you ask my sister to join us?' she asked. ‘If we're going to have fun, let's all have fun together. “Home is handiest” as the proverb says. There are no outsiders here. We're all in the family. Come one, come all!'

Cousin Zhen was by now looking for an opportunity to leave, but San-jie was careful to give him none. He had not suspected that she could be like this and deeply regretted having come; but he could not simply walk out without giving offence to Jia Lian.

Out of deliberate disregard for appearances she had taken off her hair-ornaments and outer clothes, and from time to
time as she spoke, the animated gestures with which her words were accompanied caused the imperfectly-fastened crimson shift she was wearing to gape open, revealing glimpses of leekgreen breast-binder and snow-white flesh beneath; the red shoes that peeped out below her green drawers were all the time tap-tapping or coming together in a manner that was anything but ladylike, and her earrings bobbed to and fro like little swings. To her

And a poor pair they made of it in a situation where something other than carnal satisfaction was required of them. Not only was there none of that lively repartee that might have been expected of men who prided themselves on their gallantry; they could not produce so much as a single amusing remark between them and sat there, as the effortless flow of talk continued to pour out of her, fascinated but unresponding. Sometimes she abused them, called them names, said the most outrageous things to them. It was as though the roles had been reversed – as though she was the man and they were a pair of poor, simpering playthings whose services she had paid for. And when she had had enough of playing with them, she dismissed them ignominiously, bolted the door after them, and went to bed.

From that time onwards, whenever one of the servants did some small thing to displease her, she would launch into loud abuse of Cousin Zhen, Jia Lian and Jia Rong, denouncing all three of them as swindlers, deceivers and oppressors of the widow and the orphan.

Cousin Zhen, when he finally got back after that visit, was chary of exposing himself again. Sometimes when San-jie felt in the mood, she would send one of the boys round to
summon him and he would visit her then gladly enough, for he still had some small hope of winning her; but he was careful to behave himself when he did, and to defer in everything to her wishes.

San-jie was a very peculiar young woman. She took a perverse pleasure in enhancing her natural beauty by affecting a striking style of dress and by adopting every conceivable kind of outrageously seductive attitude. The effect was that every male who encountered her was smitten – not only the susceptible ones like Jia Lian and Cousin Zhen, but those made of sterner stuff as well; yet all of them, after only a few minutes in her company, felt their ardour extinguished and their advances repelled by the reckless, forthright, almost insolent way in which she received them.

When her mother and sister took her to task for her cavalier treatment of the two cousins, she told Er-jie she was ‘stupid'.

‘Why should that pair of precious rascals be allowed to ruin girls like us that are worth a million of them and get away with it?' she said.' They shan't do so if
I
can help it. Besides, that wife of Lian's is a very dangerous woman. We're all right for the time being because she hasn't found out yet about your marriage; but she will do one of these days, and when that time comes she's not going to sit still and do nothing. There's sure to be a most terrible row, and who knows which of us will come out of it alive? It's only fair that they should be made to jump a bit now. If we're going to end up with a bad name anyway, let's at least get what we can out of them while we've got the chance!'

Her mother and sister, seeing that it was useless to argue with her, left her alone.

San-jie certainly put her precept into practice. Her demands for special kinds of food, for clothing, for jewellery became daily more extravagant and capricious. Given a silver ornament she would express a desire for a gold one. If she had something with pearls in it, she would like something with gems in it as well. While she was eating the fatted goose, her mind was already contemplating the slaughter of the duck. And woe betide the cook if anything was not quite to her taste! Over would go dishes, table and all! Or, if a newlymade
garment displeased her, no matter how expensive the material, she would quickly reduce it to ribbons, using a pair of scissors to aid the process and uttering a fresh malediction at every tear. Cousin Zhen, who, having some time previously exhausted the possibilities with Er-jie and grown somewhat tired of her, had willingly yielded her up to Jia Lian and transferred his attentions to her sister, now found that San-jie, far from proving the complaisant mistress he had hoped for, was actually costing him a great deal of money – money, moreover, on which there seemed little prospect of a return.

Nowadays when Jia Lian came he spent the whole of his time there with Er-jie and scarcely dared venture from her room. Because of San-jie he too was beginning to regret the situation into which he had got himself.

On the other hand Er-jie was so loving and so devoted to him; he found her so sympathetic. In her gentleness, in the wifely submissiveness with which she insisted on discussing everything with him before she would make any decision, she was ten times better than Xi-feng. And in respect of looks, voice and deportment she was at least five times better.

True, she was a fallen woman; and though she had repented, neither her reform nor any other excellence could bring back her virtue. But that was what
she
said. Was it not Jia Lian himself who repudiated it?

‘Everybody makes mistakes,' he would say. ‘As long as you know that you were wrong and don't do it again, that's all that matters.'

He refused to talk about the unchasteness of her past: her present goodness was enough for him.

And so, his doubts forgotten, he would cleave to her more passionately than ever. They were of one heart, one mind. He swore they should live and die together. Xi-feng and Patience were banished totally from his thoughts.

Inevitably these pillow-sessions would end with Er-jie urging Jia Lian to do something about her sister.

‘Why don't you talk it over with Zhen and think of someone you both know of who can marry her?' she said on the last of these occasions. ‘She can't stay here like this indefinitely. Sooner or later there will be trouble.'

‘I did talk to Zhen about it the other day,' said Jia Lian, ‘but he couldn't give up the idea of keeping her for himself. I said to him, “That piece of meat is too hot for chaps like us, Zhen. The rose is a very pretty flower, but you can get some nasty jabs from its spines. You'll never hold a girl like that down. Much better find a husband for her and get her off your hands.” But he wouldn't say “yes” and he wouldn't say “no”: he just hummed and hawed for a bit and left it at that. So what can I do?'

‘Don't worry,' said Er-jie. ‘We'll speak to San-jie herself about it tomorrow. If we can persuade her to agree in principle to a betrothal, it can be left to her to have it out with Cousin Zhen herself. Once she has convinced him that he has nothing to hope for, he will
have
to do something about finding her a husband.'

Next day Er-jie spent the morning preparing a little party for the four of them, and Jia Lian, instead of going off as he usually did, deliberately stayed indoors. At about noon Er-jie invited her sister over and, when she arrived, seated her next to their mother in the place of honour. San-jie knew perfectly well what the subject of this meeting was to be and, as the wine was going round for the third time, before her sister had had a chance to broach it, she burst into tears and proceeded to do so herself.

‘I'm sure the only reason you have invited me here today, sister, is to give me a lecture, but I'm not stupid and I don't need to be nagged at as if I were a child. We all know what happened in the past, and there is no point in dragging it up now. The important thing is that as you are comfortably settled and Mamma's future is now assured, it's time to start thinking about how
I
am to be disposed of. However, this matrimony business is no children's game: it's a girl's whole lifetime to the day she dies that is decided by it. In the past, because we were so vulnerable and one could never be sure what designs men might have on one, I deliberately acted in a shameless manner in order to keep them at bay. Now I am willing to put all that behind me and turn myself into a good and obedient wife. On one condition, though: the man I marry has got to be somebody I know about and somebody
who is to my liking. If I leave the choice to you, I am sure you will do your best to find someone rich and well-placed and good-looking, but if it is someone I cannot give my heart to, I shall feel that the whole of my life has been wasted.'

Jia Lian smiled reassuringly.

‘That's easy. We leave the choice entirely to you. Just name the man and we will take care of the expenses. Your mother will have nothing to worry about.'

‘I don't need to name him,' said San-jie. ‘Er-jie has known about him all along.'

‘Who is it?' Jia Lian asked, turning to Er-jie; but Er-jie could not for the moment think who her sister had in mind.

‘I know who it is!' Jia Lian clapped his hands delightedly, suddenly convinced that he had thought of the right answer. ‘And a very good choice too!' he added.

‘Who?' said Er-jie.

‘No one else could ever be good enough for her. It has to be Bao-yu.'

Er-jie and Mrs You felt sure that he was right, but San-jie herself repudiated the suggestion indignantly.

‘I suppose you think that if we were ten sisters instead of only three, every one of us would have to marry a Jia. There
are
other males in the world besides the ones in your family, you know.'

The other three were nonplussed. If it was not Bao-yu that she had in mind, then who could it be?

‘Don't just look under your noses,' said San-jie. ‘Try casting your mind back five years, sister.'

But at that point Joker arrived, one of Jia Lian's most trusted pages and sharer of his secrets.

‘Sir She has been asking for you, sir,' said Joker. ‘I told him that you'd gone off to Sir Wang's and then hurried here as quickly as I could to let you know.'

‘Were they asking about me at home yesterday?' Jia Lian sounded a trifle concerned.

‘I told the mistress that you were at the family temple discussing arrangements for the Hundred Days with Mr Zhen and thought you might not be able to get back.'

Jia Lian called for his horse to be led out and set off immediately, with Rich in attendance. Joker was left behind at the disposal of the women. Er-jie had two plates of food and a large cup of wine set down on the edge of the kang beside him and invited him to eat and drink standing, while she asked him a few questions. In fact she asked him a great many. How old was Xi-feng? In what way was she so awful? How old was Grandmother Jia? How many girls were there? And so on. Joker, smiling broadly, proceeded, between large sips of wine, to give the old lady and her two daughters a detailed exposé of the Rong mansion and its inhabitants.

‘I'm one of the boys from the inner gate,' he told them. ‘I belong to one of two groups of four. We work there by shifts. One group goes on duty as the other one comes off. Of us eight, some, like me, are in the master's confidence, some are in the mistress's. Those of us who are in the master's confidence daren't say a word to upset the mistress's boys; but she can say or do whatever she likes to us. You want to know what she's like? A cruel heart and a sharp tongue, that about sums her up. The master's no softy, but he can do nothing with her. There's a Miss Patience working for her though. She's very nice. Though she's so well in with the mistress, she'll often do you a kindness behind her back. When one of us boys is in trouble, the mistress will be down on us like a ton of bricks, but if we can get Patience to put in a word for us, we know we shall be all right. Everyone hates the mistress. The only exceptions are Her Old Ladyship and Her Ladyship. The others pretend to like her, because they're afraid. She knows she hasn't got any rivals and she always takes very good care to keep both Their Ladyships happy, so consequently whatever she says goes, nobody else dares stand up to her. She's a great one for saving. She must have saved a mountain of money by now. That's why Their Ladyships are always saying what a good manager she is. They don't realize how much we servants have to suffer so that she can take the credit. Whenever anything good happens, you can be sure that she'll get in with the news first, before anyone else does, so that she can reap the benefit. But when things go wrong or she's made a slip herself, she'll very quickly step
aside and fasten the blame for it on someone else. She'll even fan the flames up and make it hotter for that other person once she's safely out of it herself. Even her mother-in-law can't stand her. “The magpie looking for a bigger nest who set up house with the crow” she calls her. She says she's no business meddling with the affairs of our household when she ought to be looking after her own. She says if it weren't for Her Old Ladyship, she'd have ordered her back long ago and made her stay where she belongs.'

Er-jie laughed.

‘If you say things like this behind
her
back, what must you say behind
mine
? In my case there are even more things to criticize!'

Joker fell on his knees, protesting.

‘If I ever said a word against you, madam, I should deserve to be struck by lightning! It would have been a great blessing for all of us if the master had married you first instead of the mistress. I know there would have been fewer beatings and cursings for us boys and we shouldn't have had to go around the way we do in fear and trembling all the time. There isn't a boy among us who isn't every day and everywhere singing your praises and saying what a kind and considerate lady you are. We are planning to ask the master to let us stay here and serve you all the time.'

‘Get up, get up!' said Er-jie, laughing. ‘Little impertinence! I was only joking; how easily you are scared! I'm sure I don't know what you should want to come here for.
I
am thinking of going to see your mistress.'

Joker waved his hand in vigorous disapproval.

‘Don't do that, madam, whatever you do! It would be much better if you never set eyes on her as long as you live. She's “soft of tongue and hard of heart”, “two faces and three knives”, she'll “give you a smile and trip you up the while”, she's “a welcoming fire when you see her, but a stab in the back when it's dark” – all those things and more. I don't think even Miss You here could get the better of her in an argument, so I'm sure a quiet, gentle lady like you would be no match for her.'