Peony: A Novel of China (6 page)

I have no one, she thought plaintively.

And then she denied this with the hard truthfulness that was her secret heart. She was lying to herself. She wanted to stay in the house of Ezra because she could never bear to leave David. “David” she called him in her heart and would always so call him, however she taught her lips to say “Master.”

I love him, she thought. I would not go, no matter what was given me in exchange for him.

Thus she declared herself to her own heart. With truth, a clear peace descended upon her. She knew now what she wanted and would have. There remained only the matter of how to get it and keep it.

The house of the Rabbi was next to the synagogue on the Street of the Plucked Sinew. Long ago the street had been so named because of the mysterious Jewish rite of plucking the sinew from flesh before it could be eaten. The Chinese called the synagogue The Temple of the Foreign God. But the Jews called it The Temple of God. Once passers-by had wondered at the sounds of weeping that came from within. The weeping had almost ceased as the years went on, and then the only sounds that came from the synagogue were the long, slow, wailing chants one day in seven. Even the sound of the chanting had grown weaker as more years passed, and now those who passed by had to stop and listen, if they were to hear the voices within the heavy closed doors. The very building was falling into slow ruin. The typhoons of each summer tore at the cornices and the eaves, and when stones fell they were not replaced.

The same decay was creeping into the house of the Rabbi, which was near the synagogue. Moss grew between the flagstones of the court through which Madame Ezra and Peony walked while their sedans waited at the gate. Old Wang had been sent ahead to announce Madame Ezra’s visit, and now he met them at the door of the guest hall.

“The Teacher was asleep, Mistress,” he explained. “The young lady, his daughter, was in the kitchen alone, and she ran to comb her hair and change her garments. She begged me to ask you to seat yourself. She will come quickly with her father.”

Madame Ezra inclined her head and stepped over the rotting doorsill and into the guest hall. It was called a hall, although actually it was only a small room set with common furniture. But it was clean and Leah had put some white scented lilies into a brown jar on the table. No tea was served in this house, for it was a Chinese fashion. Madame Ezra sat down and motioned Peony to a stool.

“Sit down, child,” she said. “You need not stand while we are alone. And you, Old Wang, may return home to your work.”

Old Wang bowed and went away, and Madame Ezra waited in the silent little room. Since she did not speak, Peony did not either. The young girl sat gracefully erect upon the wooden stool, her small hands clasped in her lap. She knew perfectly how to sit at ease, waiting, her look pleasant and yielding. There was no impatience or urgency in her bearing. When in a few minutes they heard shuffling footsteps, she rose and took her place behind the chair on which Madame Ezra sat.

Thus they were when the faded blue linen curtain in the doorway was pushed aside and Leah came in leading her father, the old Rabbi. He walked with a long staff in his right hand, his left arm leaning upon Leah’s shoulder. The Rabbi had been tall in his youth, far above the height of the average man, and he was still tall, in spite of his aged stoop. He wore the robes of his people this morning as he always did, and though they were patched, they were clean. Snow-white, too, was his long beard, and his skin was clean and fair, in spite of his wrinkles.

“My daughter,” the Rabbi said to Madame Ezra.

“I have waked you, Father,” Madame Ezra replied. She rose and went forward to meet the old man, and he touched her hand delicately and quickly and then her head, in blessing. Leah led him to the chair opposite that in which Madame Ezra had been sitting.

“Please sit down, Aunt,” Leah said, and when Madame Ezra had sat down, she moved a high stool near to her father. Then doubtfully she looked at Peony. “You—will you sit down?” she asked.

Peony inclined her head sweetly. “Thank you, Young Lady, I must be ready to serve my mistress,” she replied softly.

Leah sat down. Nothing could have marked more clearly than this the change from her childhood, when she and Peony had been two little girls, playing children’s games with David, and now, when one was a bondmaid and the other the young mistress of her father’s house.

“I should have waked long ago,” the Rabbi said in a voice surprisingly strong for his age. “But the truth is, daughter, that our Passover feast rouses sad memories in me and I lie awake in the night, sorrowing. These poor eyes—” he touched his blind eyes, “can still weep, even though they can no longer see.”

Madame Ezra sighed. “Do we not all weep together in our exile?”

“I grow old,” the Rabbi went on, “and my son is too young to take my place. Where is Aaron, Leah?”

“He went out early this morning, Father, and he has not come back,” Leah replied.

“Did he say where he was going?” the Rabbi asked.

“No, Father.”

“But you should have asked,” the Rabbi insisted.

“He did not want to tell me, Father,” Leah said gently.

Against the spare faded figure of the old man, the beauty of Leah was startling. The pure spring sunshine fell upon the tile floor in a square of pure light, and it lit her beauty into vividness. She was slender but rounded, strong in her looks, and rich in her coloring, and yet a vague timidity lent a modesty to her bearing that was almost childlike. Her full lips were red this morning, and her eyes were nearly perfect in their shape and in their deep brown coloring, the lashes long and curling, and the brows dark. Her hair was curling, too, and today she had tied it back from her face with a strip of narrow red satin at the nape of her neck. Her dress was a simple robe of coarse white linen. It fell to her feet and was girdled about her slender waist with a wide red strip of the same satin that bound her hair. The sleeves were short and her creamy arms were bare.

Peony under the cover of her straight lashes watched this beauty with appreciation and wonder. Her mind played now about the beautiful foreign girl with question and doubtful answer. When—or if—Leah came into the house of Ezra, as David’s wife, would she be shrewd to see all that went on under that ample roof? Would she protest and forbid, would she lead David away again into the dreams of his own people?

“Aaron should not leave without telling you where he goes, Father,” Madame Ezra was saying.

“He is young,” the Rabbi sighed.

“Not too young to remember his duty,” Madame Ezra said firmly. “He is the only one to follow after you, Father, and he must remember his duty to his people. If he fails, there will be none left to lead us home when the time comes.”

“Oh, that it might come in my lifetime!” the old rabbi mourned.

“But we must remain ready, even though it does not,” Madame Ezra said earnestly. “The synagogue should be repaired, Father, and we should revive the remnant of our people. As it is, our men are forgetting and our children never know our heritage. You should give Aaron the task of collecting the funds for the repairs. A good idea, Father—and I will promise five hundred pieces of silver as the beginning.”

“Ah, if all our people were like you,” the old rabbi replied. “But it is a good idea, eh, Leah? Aaron could busy himself with it and it would give him something to do.”

“Yes, Father,” Leah said doubtfully. She looked down into the pool of brightness about her feet.

These strange foreign people, Peony was thinking, the beautiful old man, the beautiful girl, even Madame Ezra handsome and stately, all burning from within! And why did their eyes glow and their faces grow rapt and their voices so grave while they spoke? Some spirit came out of them and enveloped them in a mystic unity that shut her out. Her downcast eyes fell on Leah’s hands clasped loosely over her knees. They were like a boy’s hands, the fingers square at the ends, strong and rough. Peony looked down at her own little hands as they rested on the back of Madame Ezra’s chair—soft, small, narrow hands, the fingers pointed as a girl’s fingers should be. Leah’s hands were like Madame Ezra’s, except that Madame’s were not workworn. They were smooth and plump and she wore rings on the first fingers of each hand and on each thumb. Leah wore no rings.

“Yet I did not come to talk about the synagogue,” Madame Ezra was saying.

The Rabbi inclined his silvery head. A small black skullcap covered the crown of it, but his hair curled about its edges.

“What then, my daughter?” he asked courteously.

“I do not know whether Leah should stay or go while I speak,” Madame Ezra said, looking at the girl kindly.

Leah rose. “I will go.”

“No,” Madame Ezra decided abruptly. “Why should you? You are not a child and we are not Chinese. It is quite permissible to speak before you of your marriage.”

Leah sat down again hesitating. Peony watched her sidewise from under her lashes. At the word “marriage” a dark rich red flooded up from Leah’s straight neck and shoulders; it crept up her cheeks and into the roots of her hair. Seeing it, Peony felt the blood drain down from her own face and her heart began to beat slowly and heavily. The talk would go on before her, as a matter of course, for who would consider whether a bondmaid had a heart? Madame Ezra, in her shrewdness, might think it well for her to hear of David’s marriage. Peony dropped her head low and stood like a small image of marble, her hands folded together upon the back of Madame Ezra’s chair.

“Marriage,” Madame Ezra repeated. “It is time, Father, to speak of our children. My son is no longer a child.”

“Leah is only eighteen,” the Rabbi said doubtfully. “Besides, what would I do without her?”

“To be eighteen is to be a woman,” Madame Ezra retorted, “and you cannot keep her forever. We can hire a good Jewish woman to take her place. I will see to it. I know just the one—Rachel, the daughter of Eli and that woman he married—”

“A Chinese,” the Rabbi said still more doubtfully.

“Only partly,” Madame Ezra said firmly. “It is hard to find servants now who are purely of our people. I myself use only Chinese. It is better not to mix them. But to take Leah’s place here, of course, we must have a woman who understands the rites and can help you. Rachel knows enough for that. And her husband is dead.”

“He was a Chinese,” the Rabbi said plaintively.

“It is as much as we can do to get our sons married to women of our people nowadays,” Madame Ezra replied. “That is why I want my son married now. Leah, you must help me!”

A look of trouble came into Leah’s deep eyes. “How can I help you?” she murmured.

“You must come and visit me,” Madame Ezra said. “It is natural and right that at this age, when you are entering womanhood, you should come and stay with me, your mother’s friend. We were like sisters, she and I, and I have long had it in my mind that you should come to me.”

They were interrupted by a sound at the door. Aaron came in impetuously and then stopped, confounded by their unexpected presence. He gave a snigger of embarrassment.

“Aaron!” Leah whispered distressfully.

“My son!” the Rabbi cried. “How fortunate! Now we can talk with you. Aaron, sit down here, my son, near me.”

The Rabbi felt for a chair, but Aaron did not move toward him. He took off his turban and wiped his hot forehead. It was Leah that rose and moved a chair near to the father and motioned to her brother. He sat down, trying to control his rapid breathing.

“Why have you been running?” the Rabbi asked.

“Because I wanted to,” Aaron answered sullenly. He was a slight pallid young man and his eyes were small and black and set close on either side of a thin hooked nose. His curly black hair hung untidily from under his turban.

Madame Ezra gazed at him with dislike. “You do not look as the Rabbi’s son should,” she now said majestically. “You look as common as anybody’s son.”

Aaron did not answer. He threw her instead a shrewd peevish glance, sharp with hostility.

“Aaron!” Leah murmured again.

“Be quiet!” he commanded her in a fierce whisper.

“My son, do you not give greeting to our guests?” the Rabbi asked.

“Let us go on with our conversation,” Madame Ezra said.

“Yes, yes,” the Rabbi murmured. “Aaron, Madame Ezra wants Leah to come and stay with her for a while.”

“Who’s to look after us?” Aaron inquired rudely.

“Rachel will come,” Madame Ezra replied.

“Do you mind if I go, Aaron?” Leah asked half timidly.

“Why should I mind? Do as you like,” he replied. His eyes, roving about the room, now fell upon the silent Peony, and there they fastened themselves. She felt his coarse gaze and did not lift her eyelids.

Then Madame Ezra saw it and was angered. She rose, interposing herself between the two. “Let us decide it so, Father. Leah can come to me tomorrow. I will send a sedan for her, and at an earlier hour Rachel will come. Leah, you can tell her everything to be done. And do not set a day for your return—I may keep you for a long time.”

Madame Ezra smiled and nodded to Leah, who had risen when she rose. Then bowing her farewell to the Rabbi, she left the room without giving heed to Aaron. The Rabbi rose too, and leaning upon Aaron’s arm, he followed Madame Ezra to the gate.

Leah walked on his other side, and Peony went ahead to prepare the chair carriers.

Thus Madame Ezra returned to her house. She was ill pleased with her own thoughts, that Peony could see. She was very silent when she had reached her own rooms, and she gave brief commands for the preparation of the small east court for Leah. Peony stood to receive these commands, and when she had heard them she turned and went to fulfill them, only to hear Madame Ezra call her again from the gate of the court.

“Young girls have natural instincts,” Madame Ezra said to Peony. “Do you prepare those two rooms as you can imagine Leah would like to have them prepared, with the scrolls and vases, flowers and perfumes, that she will most enjoy.”

“But Madame, how do I know what a young foreign lady will most enjoy?” Peony inquired. She met Madame Ezra’s fixed stare with a wide and innocent gaze.