My Splendid Concubine (26 page)

Robert
looked at Ayaou. His respect for her deepened. She sat quietly in the shadows of the flickering candlelight with her expression serene. Her youth was glowing. Her black eyebrows looked as if they’d been waxed.

“
Father cried when he saw me awake,” Ayaou said softly. “He said he missed my mother and was sure she would have found a way to persuade me to quit what I was doing if she were alive. Father beat me because he wanted me to have a good future. To be ignorant and stupid is a woman’s blessing. It took me many years to understand my father was right. Our family’s condition could never support my dreams. Learning to read and write beautiful poems would make me feel miserable about my life. My father was trying to protect me.”

“
Did you decide to give up on your dream?” Robert carefully selected his Chinese words, so the question was not an insult. He couldn’t imagine what it would be like not to be able to read. Reading was a large part of his life. He loved books.

“
I killed it.” She smiled bitterly. “I promised father I would never upset him again, but my desire never truly died.”

“
What did you do?”

“
Nothing. What could I do? Knowing my father is at peace is the reason I stay in my lot.”

“
Me too,” Shao-mei said, moving closer to her sister.

“
What if,” Robert said, “there was an opportunity? I mean there was someone willing to teach you. Would you learn?”

“
Do not take the misery of other people and play with it,” Ayaou said. She stood. “Let’s finish washing the dishes, Shao-mei.”

“
I’m serious!” Robert pulled on Ayaou’s arm and dragged her back to sit beside him.

The gir
ls stared at him in disbelief.

“
I want to teach you the verses and poems you sing every day. The lessons start now,” he said, and wanted to find his brush pen, ink-stone and rice paper. “But for this to work, you will have to be my ink-boy.”

Ayaou
was excited and grateful. She threw herself at him to squeeze and hug him. Turning to her sister, she said, “Shao-mei, let’s compete to see who will be a better student. Our master has spoken. We cannot say no.”

“
I do not want to learn.” Shao-mei formed her lips forward into the shape of a teapot spout. “Father said it is a waste of time for a woman to learn to read. It is not reading that makes a man happy. Isn’t that true, Master?”

“
Well, I’m different. I’d like to see you read a book. That will make me happy.”

“
You are lying.” Shao-mei made her hands into fists and hammered at Robert’s shoulders. “You can’t make me read if I don’t want to.”

“
Ayaou will make you.”

“
She and I are almost the same size. She can’t win.”

“
Then I will,” Robert said. “Ayaou, take me to a cane seller next time we go to the market. I’ll buy a cane to use on Shao-mei.” He struck a pose as if to strike.

“
You are not a master. You are a monster!” Shao-mei screamed happily and ran from him. Her behavior delighted him, so he joined in her game and chased her around the table.

It was difficult for Robert to accept that he was now the head of a family. What they had was like a fantasy, and he wondere
d when it would dissolve. He knew a weakness was hidden inside his relationship with the sisters that could turn into a nightmare, and it was called lust and jealousy. Thoughts of seducing Shao-mei were rearing their ugly boiled faces again invading his head like a swarm of unwanted demons.

Robert recalled his idea of matching Shao-mei with Gu
an-jiah. There had to be a way. However, if Robert taught her to read, what would Guan-jiah think? Maybe he wouldn’t like it. Maybe in this culture ignorant women were more desired than intelligent ones.

“
It is getting late,” Ayaou said after the lesson. “Let’s go to bed.” The sisters went to clean up. Then Ayaou sent Shao-mei to her room, the smaller bedroom that wasn’t much more than a closet. It was across the hall from the room Robert shared with Ayaou. It was easy for him to imagine her standing there in her room taking her clothing off before getting into bed.

Robert followed Ayaou up the narrow stairs built for smaller feet. H
e was constantly concerned he’d miss a step and tumble to the bottom. Breaking his neck wasn’t a pretty picture to carry around.

Once they were in the bedroom and behind a closed door, Ro
bert turned to Ayaou and reached for her like a hungry stallion running toward fertile grassy fields. He had an endless thirst for her lips. Ayaou had an equal desire. It was as if she had to restrain herself during the day to keep her hands off him, but once in the privacy of their bedroom, she unleashed her appetite. She loved to stand by the bed and undress him one item of clothing at a time. He did the same to her until they were both naked.

Since he had rescued her
from Ward, her desire for him had increased. Robert wondered how she’d feel if she discovered he hadn’t paid Ward yet. It was something he’d deliberately hidden from everyone. Even Patridge didn’t know.

It used to be that she had to exhaust herself to be completely ha
ppy, but tonight Robert found Ayaou wasn’t concentrating. In the middle of their bodily explorations, she suddenly stopped.

“
What’s wrong, Ayaou?”

“
Robert,” she said, “I must talk to you about something serious. Let us sit on the bed.”

Robert sat and realized he was holding his breath. He had to force himself to b
reathe. Had she discovered she still belonged to Ward? He felt a stab of guilt for keeping that information from her. “What is it?” He dreaded what she might say.

“
I must tell you Shao-mei feels ugly.”

“
Nonsense.” He relaxed. She still didn’t know about Ward. He wanted to make love again. If he smothered her with kisses, she would have to stop talking. After all, she was sitting there naked. She looked so tempting.

He reached for her. S
he scooted out of reach. “You do not understand,” she said. “Robert, this is important. Listen to me.”

“
I do understand, and she’s being ridiculous,” he replied. “She’s an intelligent, energetic and lovely child.”

“
She is not a child.” Ayaou turned serious. “She is a woman ten months younger than I am. We can both produce children.”

“
What’s this? What’s going on?” Feeling odd, he left the bed and pulled a bathrobe over his naked body.

Ayaou motioned for him to return to the bed. When he did, she took his hands in hers.
“While we were at Captain Patridge’s house waiting for you to return, she told me about your first time together. She was heartbroken when you would not take her.”

Robert stared at the woman in front of him with wide-open eyes. He moved his lips as if he
was speaking but nothing came out. She talked as if it were normal that he should have her younger sister. Did she mean it or was this a test?

“
You should have respect for my culture,” she said. “China is a society where a common man can purchase as many concubines as he can afford. You must respect my wishes and consider my happiness. I believe that you are not sincere when you tell me you are a one-woman man. I believe that eventually you will get another concubine and why not now, why not Shao-mei, my sister, whom I love.”

Robert had no choice but to make her see things his way, b
ecause what she had just revealed was his horrible fantasy. The nightmare he feared was rearing its ugly, lusty ghoulish head. Robert couldn’t allow that to happen. He wanted to throw ice water on this and kill it before it started.

“
It’s just that I’m in love with you.” He grasped at words that would save him while another part of him craved to open this new door and see what was on the other side. A battle raged inside him, but he continued to deny that he wanted Shao-mei. He knew he was falling in love with her. “You’re the only woman I want.” The lie slipped easily out of his mouth and into the room. “Besides, it would be a betrayal of our love if I took your sister.”

It was also a betrayal of an oath he
’d taken when he left Ireland. Robert had sworn to allow only one woman into his life—the one he would eventually marry. In Belfast, while he was attending college, he’d allowed himself to have as many women as possible. It had been wrong—something that he was sure he would answer for in the next life. The Chinese were fortunate they didn’t believe in life after death. It was probably why Ayaou and Shao-mei were acting the way they were. They saw nothing wrong with one man having many women.

Loving and sleeping with Ayaou had been the first step in b
etraying his oath. Adding Shao-mei to the equation would take him to a level of sin he’d never imagined possible. Robert would be right back where he’d started with the same type of lascivious behavior that had led him to banish himself from home except this time it would be worse. Instead of one woman at a time, he would be in bed with two.

His words didn
’t register with Ayaou, who said. “I know that in your country good men take only one wife, but how do you explain the fact that most foreigners who come to China like Ward and Patridge buy as many women as they can afford?”

“
I’m different! I have no respect for what they do! Besides, I cannot guarantee I can afford the responsibility of our relationship. How could I add on Shao-mei? I don’t want to ruin her future. I care about her.”

Again,
Robert thought of Guan-jiah as a choice. It wasn’t going to be easy because his servant was a eunuch. It also didn’t help that he didn’t have kind things to say about boat people.

For a moment, Robert considered selling more of himself to P
atridge to raise a dowry for Shao-mei. There’d have to be so much money involved Guan-jiah couldn’t say no. He had to admit there was a possibility a bribe in the form of a dowry wouldn’t be enough for Guan-jiah to want Shao-mei as his platonic soul mate. If Guan-jiah wouldn’t take her off his hands, Robert would have to consider the unthinkable. He would have to sell Shao-mei to a stranger and remove her from his life.

“
You are making little sense to me and no sense to Shao-mei, Robert. She won’t understand.” Ayaou leaned over and kissed his neck, which caused him to break out in goosebumps. “She worships and desires you. While she was at Patridge’s house, she saw what life was like for his concubines. She saw how Captain Patridge gave them to his friends as nightly gifts. She knows you saved her from that life. Now she only wants to know that you are pleased with her. If you take her, she will stop feeling insecure. She will know she belongs.”

“
What does she expect of me? I mean, what does she want?” His hands were clammy. He was covered with nervous sweat.

“
You know how much I enjoy what you do with me. Shao-mei wants to know the same pleasure.”

He choked. H
is heart started to race. It felt as if there were a peach pit stuck in his throat, and he couldn’t swallow it. It was a trap he couldn’t escape. His nature was driving him to betray his family, his friends and his religion.

“
Would you spare a little of your love for her? A little. For me.” Ayaou’s words were gentle and soft, but in his ears the words amplified themselves and sounded as loud as thunder.

“
But it would be wrong!” He heard his voice yell, which wasn’t what his thoughts were urging him to do. His thoughts were screaming to agree with her. “I can’t do it! You’d lose respect for me.”

“
I would not lose respect for you, Robert. Shao-mei is not only my sister, but she is also your second concubine. You bought her. You should take care of her and to do this you must make her feel worthy.”

“
How will you take it, Ayaou? I’m sure you’ll be jealous.” He stopped and stared at her incredulous. “Wouldn’t you?” He was pleading for her to agree with him.

“
Not really. Since I know that I am number one, the superior one, I will be happy. Let me put it this way—I will be worse off if you take another concubine, which you will like every other man in China who can afford it. You will find a stranger with a spoiled character. She might hate me and do nasty things to me. It happens often in households. There are even murders. I am safe with Shao-mei. She will be satisfied as your number two concubine. We both will feel fortunate to make a family out of this. Shao-mei and I are close like a tea mug and its lid.”

“
But I’m only capable of loving one woman,” he said, doubting his words. He already knew he loved Shao-mei, but he wanted to think of her as a sister. “It’ll be impossible for me to become intimate with Shao-mei. Ayaou, you’ll tell her that I cannot be involved with two women at the same time. I just can’t. You are the only woman I will share my bed with. We’ll just have to find someone else for Shao-mei. What about Guan-jiah?”

He could tell that this u
pset Ayaou, because her voice went up an octave. “You don’t love me enough. If you find a Chinese man for her, he will beat her, have other women, gamble, and make her life miserable. If you find another foreigner, he would be like Ward or Patridge and use her until he didn’t find her attractive anymore. After that, he’d sell her to be a whore for sailors. Is that what you desire for my sister, who is like my other half? Besides, Guan-jiah is a eunuch. Shao-mei could never have children by him.”

“
How did you know he’s a eunuch?” Robert said, stunned. “I never told you that.”

“
He smells like one,” she replied. “Can’t you tell? They all smell the same. They leak urine and wear a thick cotton pad to absorb it.”

“
I can’t believe this is happening. You’re saying this because I refuse to seduce your sister. You two are crazy!”

“
You are selfish, Robert. Your passion is like an ocean. Why not spare a little for my sister? It is all she is asking for. Would you acknowledge that I sometimes cannot keep up with you? You want me three times a night, and sometimes that is not enough. Why can’t you let Shao-mei take some pressure off me?”

“
Ayaou, please understand I wouldn’t care to be loyal to you if I didn’t love you!”

“
Shao-mei does not care if you love her, Robert.” Ayaou shot back. “She only wants to make you happy. What you give her she will treasure for the rest of her life. I am sure she can never get this kind of love from any other man. I pity my sister and me too.”

Robert rolled over on his side away from her.
“Go away,” he said in English, so she wouldn’t understand. “You don’t know what you’re talking about, Ayaou. You’ve no idea what it has taken for me to forsake my God and what I was raised to believe, so I could live here and be in love with you. I’m sure that your naiveté and kindness hasn’t prepared you to deal with your nature as a human. You don’t know what jealousy is and what it can do to destroy you. It is easy for you to push me into this, but it’ll be hard for you to deal with afterwards. It’ll be too late and one can never undo a pot of tea that’s already been brewed.”

After Robert
’s tirade fizzled, silence filled the room like a whiteout after a snowstorm. Ayaou fell quiet and eventually went to sleep. What a strange night, a strange place and strange girls.

The next day a letter arrived from Ireland. It was from Robert’s sister Mary. The seal on the letter appeared to have been broken. All his mail came through Hong Kong and then through Shanghai. Robert wondered if someone was reading his letters. This wasn’t the first letter he’d found with the seal undone.

Was someone spying on him and if so, why? He shrugged. He was being paranoid again. Who would want to read his mail? After all, he was a nobody
—just a lowly paid interpreter. He only had one enemy he could think of, and that was Ward. By now, Ward had probably forgotten Robert was alive. After all, the man was struggling to heal his battle wounds in some isolated house in the countryside.

What could Ward learn by opening Robert
’s letters from Ireland? The answer was nothing. Then it occurred to Robert that maybe the letters he was writing home were getting the same treatment. He stopped reading Mary’s letter in an attempt to remember if he’d ever mentioned where he was living in Ningpo. He was sure he’d never written home about renting a house. As far as his family and friends knew, he still lived at the Ningpo consulate, and Robert wanted to keep it that way.

He started to read Mary
’s letter again. She had always been his favorite. She was the calmest and always level headed. She knew who she was and what she wanted from life. She set goals and worked toward them. As far as Robert could see, Mary didn’t have his weaknesses. She took after father but in a better, less judgmental way. She enjoyed sewing, cooking and cleaning house. In the evenings after the dinner dishes were washed and put away, Mary always played piano and sang. She had a great voice, and Robert missed it. To bad he couldn’t have found a woman like her for a wife before he’d left Ireland. With a proper woman by his side, he wouldn’t be in this predicament with Ayaou and Shao-mei. There had been a time when he’d wished Mary wasn’t his sister. Robert thought of her as the perfect woman.

Robert realized
he had inherited some of their mother’s wildness, which might have been the foundation of his problems.

In the letter
, Mary wrote that a wonderful man, a linen merchant, was courting her. He worked long days like their father. They saw each other only on Sundays after church. She said she admired him for his industriousness and could only hope that he’d ask father for her hand in marriage. She wanted to move to Lisburn, where the man lived, and give him children to work in his family’s business.

Reading the letter triggered gu
ilty thoughts for the life he was living. He had to tame his wild streak. He should have been working endless hours toward his future instead of spending so much time with Ayaou and Shao-mei enjoying pleasure for its own sake. He couldn’t ignore the temptation that was offered to him through Shao-mei. It was more than Robert could handle. He could lie to Ayaou, but he couldn’t lie to himself. He was attracted to Shao-mei. She was a beautiful young woman. He ached to have her.

The conversation with Ayaou and the letter from Mary tri
ggered a change in Robert. He started spending more hours at the consulate. He knew that he was doing it to avoid Shao-mei. It was a continuing struggle to keep her out of his head. He even started to work a few hours each Sunday. He was also taking care writing the letters that went to Ireland. He avoided mentioning anything that provided clues to where he lived in Ningpo. His letters became shorter and more cryptic. He stopped writing about Chinese culture and art for fear that one small incident or description might provide a clue to someone like Ward.

Chapter 15

God’s servants did not know Patridge. Robert envied the man for that. He, on the other hand, was not an invisible person who could sin at will. He had crossed the river and eaten with the missionaries. He had also gone to church services on the Sabbath. They didn’t know Patridge, but they knew Robert. They knew that he cared about his ultimate salvation.

The fact that Robert hadn
’t been to a sermon since leaving Ningpo for Patridge’s summerhouse bothered him. If any of the missionaries knew the depth of sin he’d allowed himself to sink into, they would have been struck speechless. They’d pity him and pray for his eternal soul. Patridge, on the other hand, came from a different world—one that Robert was fascinated with but uncomfortable in. The captain didn’t care what the missionaries thought.

Ayaou slipped from the bed, tiptoed from the bedroom, and closed the door gently behind her. The moment the door closed, he sat up. He knew she was going to Shao-mei’s room to console her, because he refused to have intercourse with the younger sister.

His mind filled with a blizzard of conflicting thoughts and em
otions. To escape his confusion, he lit a lantern and checked his pocket watch. It was a little past midnight. In desperation, he turned to a book of poems from the Southern Song Dynasty. He had escaped into poems and literature before. Maybe it would help this time too. As he leafed through the pages, one poem caught his attention. It fit his situation. He prayed that the poem offered a solution to his dilemma. The poet’s name was Lu You—dead for six hundred years.

“
Pink hands so fine,

Gold-branded wine,

Spring paints green willows palace walls cannot confine.

East wind unfair,

Happy times rare.

In my heart sad thoughts throng.

We’ve severed for years long

Wrong, wrong, wrong!
”

Robert could have added lines of his own to make it fit his life. As he understood Lu You’s history, the poet had to divorce a wife that he deeply loved. The man had written the poem to fit that occasion. Robert’s predicament was different but similar since he was in love with two women. What was he to do? Get rid of one, so he could find happiness with the other. He couldn’t bring himself to do that. He hated admitting he wanted both girls.

He got up, dressed and paced the r
oom. He opened the shutters overlooking the alley and leaned out. He smelled the stench from the open sewer. He had a strong desire to take a walk where the air was fresh despite the hour and the dangers for a foreigner. He froze as he spied the hulking shape of what looked like a large man standing below his window.

“
Who’s there?” he said in Mandarin. The man held up an arm to cover his face and hurried away. Why would someone be lurking outside his house at this hour? Could it be a thief? Feeling nervous, Robert closed the shutters. Taking a walk to clear his mind was out of the question. There was no telling what was waiting.

What would Patridge think if Robert turned to him for more mo
ney to solve this problem? The captain would be glad of binding Robert’s services to him longer. He’d also want to know why. He’d laugh at the answer. He’d think Robert a fool for not taking both of these fabulous girls. Maybe he was a fool. He felt like one.

Robert snuffed out the lantern
light, undressed and slipped back into the cold, empty bed. When Ayaou returned more than an hour later, she put a hand on his shoulder. “Robert,” she said in a whisper.

H
e pretended to be asleep and was relieved when her hand went away. In a short time her breathing told him she was sleeping. The silence was so complete that Robert heard Shao-mei crying in her room.

Depression sucked at him like a giant leech. He knew exactly how Lu You the poet felt when he had to give up a woman he loved. He must have paced in his garden or walked the streets to avoid madness. He must have missed the sound of her voice. He must have imagined kissing her lips and stroking the smooth warm skin of her naked body. Just thinking about how much he wanted her must have haunted him.

The next morning Ayaou and Shao-mei were quiet during the morning meal. Shao-mei ate slowly. She spent most of her time staring at the tips of her
chopsticks. Robert noticed she had red, swollen eyes. She must have cried all night. He felt guilty for not making love to her. At the same time, he felt guilty for wanting to. It was a terrible conundrum. Guilt was tugging him in two directions. He hated it.

With his appetite gone, he pushed the bowl of food away and stood.
“I’m going for a walk,” he said, moving toward the door.

They stood as if to join him.

“No, I’d like to go alone.” He left the house and walked the narrow, twisting streets. The city was wrapped in a blanket of soft, mushy fog—a perfect place to hide. He shivered. It was an odd chilly morning for August. He decided to go back and get his jacket.

Just as he turned to go
to the house, Robert sensed he wasn’t alone. He spun around and saw an arm appear from the fog with a club gripped in its hand. Robert sensed the body behind the arm. Without thinking, he ducked and stepped forward under the swing and punched out hitting something soft like a stomach. The club glanced off his shoulder. The assailant dropped the weapon. It clattered on the ground.

Robert dug his fist into the soft flesh
again. There was a grunt. Then the assailant was running away gasping for air. For an instant, Robert was tempted to give chase, but his revolver was still in the jacket pocket inside the house. It was stupid to attempt catching the thug without his pistol. Robert could be killed. He wondered if this was the man he’d seen in the alley. He didn’t think so. The other man was larger. Could there be two working together?

He stepped against the house and waited for the wild bea
ting of his heart to subside. He listened to the receding patter of the assailant’s running feet. If there was a second man, he could be waiting for a chance to have a go at him. Robert slid along the wall toward the door. He took stock of his situation. He rotated the shoulder the club had hit and was satisfied it wasn’t damaged. There was no pain. There probably wouldn’t be a bruise. He’d been lucky.

His quick reflexes had saved him
again as they had in the battle with the Taipings. There had been other incidents in his life like this one where he had reacted with thoughtless speed.

He remembered one of the
girls he’d been seeing in Belfast. She had stepped in front of a galloping horse pulling a wagon. At the same instant, without thinking, Robert yanked her back. Everything had slowed around him during that incident. It was as if a part of his mind had taken charge and acted. There had been no time to think. It happened faster than a breath or the blink of an eye. Then the girl had been clinging to him with her trembling body pressed to his. His reward that night had been a passionate one.

Once Robert was satisfied the assailant was gone, h
e quietly entered the house. He didn’t want the girls to know he had returned. His jacket hung on a peg protruding from the wall just inside the door. He hesitated when he heard the girls talking in the kitchen.