The Mandate of Heaven (35 page)

Deng Mansions contained as many rooms and courtyards as its grand name implied. All Teng’s life the wooden buildings had been in a state of decline. Now some roofs were positively unsafe. He found his old companion, Shensi, peering up at a rafter creaking under a drift of snow.

In the era of the Deng clan’s greatness, renting rooms to a dubious tomb-finder and antiques merchant would have been unthinkable. These days it seemed natural. An extra armed man in one’s household added greatly to its security.

‘You seem troubled,’ said Teng, taking a seat in Shensi’s cold, dusty apartment. It was cluttered with old pots and bronzes he had failed to sell.

‘Just hungry,’ grunted his friend.

‘A common problem,’ said Teng. ‘I hear that in some remote districts there are arrangements between neighbours to swap unwanted children rather than allow the entire family to perish.’

Shensi wrapped a cloak made of dog furs round himself. It crossed Teng’s mind he hadn’t heard many dogs barking lately on Monkey Hat Hill.

He slapped his hands together and paced up and down to keep warm.

‘I’ve come here for a reason, you know,’ he said. ‘If we do not get some
cash
soon we won’t last the winter. Curse the snow! Will it ever stop? And I’m dreadfully worried, Shensi, not for myself but Honourable Deng Nan-shi. He urgently needs food and medicine. I can’t even rely on picking up extra pupils: nearly all are in arrears with their fees, not that Father keeps proper accounts. A horrid mess!’

It was not Shensi’s way to answer in haste, yet today he spoke at once.

‘Bend your stiff scholar’s pride and we could eat and drink soon enough!’

He referred to an old debate between them. A year earlier, to fulfil a drunken boast, Teng had taken up some ancient parchment from Deng Library and laboriously painted a landscape in the exact style of the Tang Dynasty master, Chang Tsao, even contriving to make the paint seem suitably faded. More astonishing had been his recreation of ancient seals denoting the artist and previous owners, gleaned from woodcut prints in the library. Once the family collection had included many original paintings of this kind – all traded over the years for food and clothes. Even Deng Nan-shi had praised Teng for his remarkable mimicry. But copying a greater talent was a bittersweet triumph. Teng longed for his own paintings to be regarded as masterpieces.

Shensi’s proposal was to use his contacts among antique-loving connoisseurs and sell the forgery for a high price. Teng laughed nervously in reply. Oh, he was tempted! Horribly tempted! But such a venture threatened more than just criminal charges – and the punishment would be dreadful if their fraud was discovered – it betrayed all Father had taught him. Misusing higher knowledge and skills compromised the Deng clan’s honour. Maybe even their natural right to rule Hou-ming Province on a just dynasty’s behalf when the Imperial Examinations were re-instated. It threatened the best part of his soul.

Teng considered Father lying on the divan in the library. Also his own hunger – and not just for food. Why should vulgar merchants parade their wealth? He could buy new silks, wine, precious hours of pleasure with Ying-ge and her delightful fragrances.

‘Perhaps,’ he said, remembering a phrase of Yun Shu’s, ‘I have no choice. Perhaps I must lower myself. But just this once. And never ask me again.’

Shensi chuckled coarsely. ‘Leave the low stuff to me.’

Teng seemed not to hear.

‘I might even turn vulgar merchant myself,’ he announced. ‘Do you remember the bamboo strips from the prince’s tomb I spent so long translating?’

‘You won’t sell those,’ predicted Shensi, ‘except for firewood.’

‘We’ll see,’ said Teng. ‘From what I have heard … We’ll see. And, of course, you would get half, for we found them together. But I fear those old bamboo books contain a great capacity for harm. I mean, in the wrong hands.’

‘The only wrong hands are empty ones,’ said Shensi.

Teng felt depressed all that day. He had surrendered to instincts of a deplorable kind. Meanwhile Shensi roamed the city in the best clothes they could gather, seeking the highest price for a recently discovered painting of the Lake by Master Chang Tsao. Finally he struck a deal with a new collector said to be acting as a broker to connoisseurs in the Court itself, a high official of unimpeachable standing in the Salt Bureau, called Gui.

Clouds that covered much of the Middle Kingdom dispersed, leaving in their wake a pale, bright winter sky. The re-emergence of the sun warmed more than the earth: hearts lost to gloom remembered hope. Plans were moved forward.

Teng walked from Monkey Hat Hill to Golden Bright Temple, the largest Daoist temple in the province. He wore a fine new pair of boots and a quilted jacket of more than respectable cut, the fruit of Shensi’s profitable transaction with Salt Minister Gui. Today, however, Teng had a very different customer in mind.

Golden Bright Temple, like most of Hou-ming, had known better days during the former dynasty; nevertheless it still attracted thousands of worshippers and idlers each month. A triple-storied gatehouse painted in many colours greeted followers of the Dao. Once beyond, they walked between two glazed pagodas into a huge square surrounded by cloisters and a temple complex six storeys high with fine, ornate roofs. One could survey the entire city and far vistas from the gilded balconies of Golden Bright Temple.

A large five-day fair had been established in the courtyard. Booths and canopies formed small streets where one could buy mats of fine bamboo and rushes, bows and swords (despite the restrictions on Chinese possessing weapons), dried fruits and meats, pet songbirds and hunting dogs, inks, brushes, honey preserves, artificial flowers and hats, ribbons, books, curios and pictures. There were fortune-tellers, conjurers, portrait artists and musicians vying to draw a crowd. In a time where so many went hungry, a few sales determined whether whole families ate that evening.

Now the sun had re-emerged, however feebly, people followed its example. Teng was forced to push to the temple through knots of bargain-seekers. On the steps he paused and frowned. Was that his mistress, Ying-ge, hurrying down one of the cloisters towards an entrance guarded by soldiers? But the girl had gone in a moment and he could not be sure. Inside the temple porch he hailed an acolyte, addressing him with his best Deng hauteur.

‘I have an appointment with Worthy Master Jian,’ he said.

The young priest looked at Teng doubtfully. Even in new clothes he did not appear the kind of notable who normally consorted with the leader of all the Daoists in Hou-ming Province. Especially as he was carrying a large, heavy sack rather than assigning the task to a lackey.

‘Inform him Honourable Deng Teng is here,’ added Teng.

Now the acolyte was more amenable and bowed slightly. The name of Deng still opened some hearts and doors in Hou-ming.

For an hour he waited in the temple porch. An hour of disquiet. It was not too late to return home with the sack of bamboo strips. He could bury them in Deng Library and risk no harm to anyone. If the ancient words were as potent as he believed, dare he unleash such knowledge on the world? That dilemma tormented him.

Years of slow, careful study had revealed the strips mapped a magical route to Immortality. One that had passed beyond the knowledge of humanity for fifteen centuries. Yet that route required no virtue from anyone pursuing its tortuous path. Instead one needed the morality of a rapacious ghost. Immortality could only be gained by sucking the life force, the very
ch’i
, from ripe, fertile victims, right down to the lining of their wombs. Its logic was remorseless. Teng feared it deeply.

There was another reason. Worthy Master Jian was distrusted by his father – and Teng had learned to heed Deng Nan-shi’s judgements about people.

Of course, the old scholar might be blinded by history. The Deng and Jian clans had been bitter contenders for leadership in Hou-ming under the last dynasty. The Jians, at least, tacked with the wind and served Mongol masters. Did that make them villains? The mere act of living tainted one with compromises … Further speculation was cut short by the acolyte’s return.

Teng was led up winding flights of stairs to the topmost storey of Golden Bright Temple. Here he found a large balcony with fine views of the lake and distant snow-clad mountains. A place where pure winds aided the contemplation of ineffable mysteries.

A small table had been set up in the centre of the balcony. Behind it, on a simple chair, sat a man in the gold, purple and black robes of a Daoist Worthy Master. It was the first time Teng had observed Master Jian close up.

He saw a handsome, sleek man, trim round waist and jaw, with well-balanced features and a habitually sensitive expression, as though he made it his business to feel deeply for all the Ten Thousand Creatures, whether they wanted it or not. He possessed a moist, yet strong mouth that could be relied upon to say what was judicious, wise and proper.

Worthy Master Jian’s iron grey hair was neat as a statue’s, yet his large angular eyebrows were black as the hair of youth, denoting exceptional character. In short, he was a man who immediately attracted goodwill, especially among women; a bringer of relief; a visionary; a speaker who could urge confidentially or roar like a ram; a holy gentleman of considerable property, ever distant yet near – or, at least, near enough to suit his benevolent purposes. All this Teng glimpsed in a flash.

‘Ah, Honourable Deng Teng,’ said Worthy Master Jian, leaning forward slightly to greet his guest then settling back again. ‘Come before me! You are doubly welcome. First, for the sake of your honourable ancestors and father – I trust the excellent Deng Nan-shi is in good health, by the way, please do pass him my respects – and secondly because you sent the most intriguing letter I have received all winter. Come closer, tell me all about it.’

Teng did as instructed, placing the sack of bamboo strips on the floor. Though he was not customarily nervous with men of authority, his mouth tasted dry.

‘I do have something unusual to bring to your attention, Master,’ he said, ‘a treatise, let us call it, that has taken me years to decipher.’

Impatience flickered across the Worthy Master’s angular face. ‘A treatise?’

‘It expounds ancient wisdom and knowledge,’ said Teng, hurriedly, ‘I have come here to offer it to you.’

‘Ah,’ exclaimed Worthy Master Jian, ‘an offer!’

He stared past Teng as if in profound contemplation of the distant mountains. The silence on the balcony gathered weight. Teng could hear a babble of excited voices from the market in the courtyard below, the sounds of a quarrel about prices, laughter, all the tawdry, vulgar noises of commerce. Suddenly he felt an overwhelming desire to disturb the Worthy Master’s stillness.

‘The treatise teaches one how to become an Immortal,’ he blurted out. ‘It instructs followers of the Dao how to acquire the Pearl of Immortality.’

Still the Worthy Jian meditated. He turned to Teng, as though dragged back reluctantly to temporal affairs.

‘So your letter promised,’ he said.

‘Yes,’ continued Teng, ‘it sets out a clear, proven method.’

‘Ah!’ said Worthy Master Jian. ‘You are now an Immortal, I take it?’

Teng blushed with confusion. ‘No, I did not say that, sir, with respect …’

‘You call it proven. How can it be
proven
without proof? Are you that proof?’

‘As I say, Master …’

‘Let me see this book,’ interrupted the Worthy Jian.

Reluctantly Teng handed over one of the round bundles of bamboo strips tied with leather thongs. Worthy Master Jian cast him a resigned look and unrolled the book. Yet his gaze was intense as he read the characters.

‘This,’ he said, reading slowly, ‘this is old. Where did you find it?’

For a long while he listened as Teng described the prince’s tomb. When the scholar fell silent Worthy Master Jian tapped the volume with his forefinger.

‘So, Honourable Deng Teng, you found these texts – all the natural property of the Dao – and wish to restore them to me. Your illustrious family was ever a friend of the Dao. I believe Cloud Abode Monastery, in particular, benefited greatly from your Grandfather’s generosity. Very well, I accept. And more than that, offer my thanks.’

Worthy Master Jian sat back in his chair, smiling amiably. It took a moment for Teng to comprehend what had been said. ‘Worthy Master, in my letter I mentioned the
sale
of this relic. I am hoping for a large reward in
cash
, so I might help my Honoured Father in his illness.’

Again there was a long silence. Only now Jian’s handsome face wore a look of surprise, perhaps even sorrow. ‘
Cash
?’

‘Yes,’ repeated Teng, doggedly. ‘Sir, you cannot conceive the dangers I suffered to win these holy texts and the hours spent setting them in order and translating obscure characters …’

‘
Cash
?’ broke in Worthy Master Jian, as though thinking aloud. ‘A son of Deng Nan-shi asks me for
cash
. These are new times, I suppose, and all things decay and renew themselves, even once noble families.’ His voice fell into a bemused whisper. ‘Yet when a Deng tries to haggle like a petty merchant … Ha! Of course! Your father set you up for it! He once criticised the markets I hold each month before the temple and this joke is his revenge. How witty!’