The Yellow Papers (3 page)

He was the youngest of the boys destined for America – most being three or four years older – but he soon befriended Xi Tang, a boy from a neighbouring village, and the two became inseparable. ‘You're no bigger than a mouse,' Xi Tang had said on that first day, and from then on this became Chen Mu's nickname.

When school was out Xi Tang and Chen Mu would explore Shanghai. Sometimes the boys went to Frenchtown, as the French Concession was called, where there were more Chinese than foreigners and where the air was pungent with the smell of opium, and they hunted for brothels in the hope of seeing one of the girls, but they never succeeded.

‘
Aiyah
! These are not worth our attention anyway,' Xi Tang would say each time, forgetting that he'd been the one to suggest the hunt. ‘You want the ones in the British section – so exclusive that you can even find First Night Virgins. No older than twelve, every one of them.'

‘Have you ever gone there?' Chen Mu always asked.

‘Their feet are perfect three-inch Golden Lilies,' Xi Tang continued, always ignoring the question, ‘with an aroma so rich that a man can come from that alone.'

Chen Mu remembered the smell of his mother's feet when she unbound them at night to soak in water, before cutting away the dead skin and rebinding them, and he didn't think he'd come from such a smell, but then concluded the feet of twelve-year-old virgins probably smelt differently.

Some days they preferred the Huangpu and the Bund, which once had been no more than a muddy towing path but was now a wide, magnificent thoroughfare. They'd wander streets teeming with energy and noise, where the air always smelt of smoke and decomposing rubbish, and they'd watch boats unloading cargo. Other times they searched for streetwalkers known as ‘pheasants' because of their elaborate, gaudy dress, and
xianrou zhuang
, or ‘salt pork shops'. Unlike the higher-class
changsan
brothels, where the women specialised in singing songs from operas and hosted elaborate banquets for rich merchants and officials, and where patrons had to undergo long courtships and pay exorbitant fees before gaining any sexual favour, these lower grade brothels were devoted to instant sexual gratification. And though everyone knew that salt pork was no longer fresh meat, these premises still enjoyed a brisk business catering to the needs of labourers and rickshaw drivers, and sometimes Xi Tang and Chen Mu sneaked into their courtyards only to be chased straight out again.

But it was the Chinese City, hidden behind its high circular wall pierced by narrow gateways and surrounded by a moat, that Chen Mu loved most because it reminded him of home. Along its dark crowded streets that smelt of rotting rubbish, cooking meats and fried onion pancakes they roamed, exploring alleyways made even narrower by restaurants and tea houses, shops and stalls selling porcelains and bronzes, brocades and embroideries, and stands displaying cooked and raw meats.

And so days blended into weeks and months, and Chen Mu lost his fear of the barbarians. He understood that their women were not barrel-bodies, but that it was simply the shape of their dress, though he did wonder if the strange shape of their shoe meant that they too practised a type of foot-binding. He was relieved no one seemed interested in skinning him alive, and slowly – ever so slowly – he learned a few words of English.

And then it was the eve of the examinations.

Chen Mu barely slept that night. He was sure he would fail English and be sent back to his village in shame. He imagined himself walking back to the schoolmaster's house, giving back the lotus leaf brush-rest, because someone so stupid would not be worthy of such a gift. But when morning finally arrived he had no trouble with questions on China's history, nor with recitation. Next came English. The commissioner asked him to translate a sentence, and Chen Mu answered, sure he was wrong. The commissioner looked at the teacher, the teacher looked back, blank-faced. The commissioner asked him for another sentence, then another, and though Chen Mu again did not know the exact words, he answered as best he could.

‘That will do,' the commissioner finally said, and Chen Mu left the room, but before the door closed he thought he heard the commissioner ask the teacher, ‘Was he correct?'

He waited in the classroom until all the other boys had been tested. Never had a day passed so slowly. Finally the commissioner and the teacher came in. One by one each boy was called to the front of the room and given the much-coveted button of the cadet. The boys bowed, then returned to their seats, proud and confident.

Soon there was only Chen Mu without a button. He'd been right – he had failed the English examination. They'd left him till last so that he would see what success he could have achieved if he'd applied himself more.

‘Chen Mu,' the commissioner called.

He rose and walked to the front of the room, fighting tears, head bowed in shame.

‘Well done, Chen Mu,' and the commissioner presented him with the button.

For a moment Chen Mu stared at the commissioner, not understanding. He looked at the teacher, who smiled and nodded.

He walked back to his seat, past the smiling faces of his friends.
I passed
, he thought.
I passed! Now Mā won't think me stupid
.

3

Chen Mu was thirteen years old when, on the 24
^th
of February 1875, Teacher Yung Wing married Mary Kellogg, a young American woman who had taught some of the boys in her home when they had first arrived in America. From the Chinese Education Mission only two teachers attended the wedding, but late in the afternoon Yung Wing and his bride returned to the college, so that he could formally introduce her as his wife to the boys.

There was much congratulation and formality at first, but Mary Kellogg was already a favourite with the students, well loved for her cheerfulness and gentle manner, and it didn't take long for decorum to be replaced by laughter, teasing and games. There were many at the college who disapproved of the union, but the boys thought it a wonderful thing.

That night, after Yung Wing and his new bride had left, the boys ate supper and retired to their dormitories, still full of excitement. Chen Mu was undressing when Xi Tang crept up behind him and grabbed his queue.

‘Your turn, Mouse!' he said, brandishing scissors. Chen Mu pulled back, anxious. Though some had been quick to cut their queues and discard their Chinese robes for Western-style clothes, others, like Chen Mu, were reluctant – Director Ngen had lectured them on the importance of remaining Chinese in every way.

‘Cutting your queue,' he'd said, ‘is a sign you are no longer loyal to Confucian ideals.'

‘I don't know …' Chen Mu said, but Xi Tang laughed.

‘Come on! If it's okay for Yung Wing to marry Miss Kellogg, why do we have to still wear our hair in a queue? Why do you love this mouse's tail so much, hey?'

‘Cut the tail!' one of the boys called out. The others in the room took up the chant:
Cut the tail! Cut the tail!

‘Alright,' Chen Mu laughed, ‘cut the tail.'

He sat late into the night copying the historical text that was his punishment for cutting his queue. He didn't mind – his punishment was mild, and he liked his hair short. It was the same with the Western clothes Xi Tang had lent him until he could buy his own – they too had felt strange for the first couple of days, but now he liked the way trousers gave his legs more freedom than the robes. He chewed on the end of his pen and wondered what his mother would say if she saw him now – would she even recognise him? When he thought back to the boy he had been, there were times when even
he
didn't recognise himself …

The door of the classroom opened and a tutor came in. Chen Mu rose and bowed.

‘Sit down, Chen Mu, sit down …' he said as he pulled a chair to Chen Mu's desk.

Chen Mu frowned – this was not normal protocol.

‘Have you nearly finished this task?'

Chen Mu nodded.

‘Good. Good. You are a good student, Chen Mu. Director Ngen – well, all of us, really – we're pleased with your progress …'

‘Thank you.'

‘Yes, very pleased. Your mother would have been proud …'

‘She says she is. I received a letter last week—'

‘Yes, yes, we know. Chen Mu, about your mother – I believe she hadn't been well for some time …'

Chen Mu stared at the tutor.
Hadn't
been well?
Would have
been proud?

‘My mother is dead?'

The tutor looked away, and the silence between them grew. Then Chen Mu remembered the pus and blood in the shit-pot, and knew that deep inside he had been expecting this news for some time.

‘I need to go home. I have to perform my duties as her son.'

The tutor shook his head. ‘Young Chen, such a trip would cost a lot of money. I don't think it possible …'

Under the desk Chen Mu clenched his fists in an attempt to control his growing anger and frustration. They couldn't stop him. They had to let him go; there was no question about it.

‘And who would accompany you? You cannot travel alone.'

‘Yes I can. I'm thirteen – a man already. I have to go.'

‘I don't think—'

‘I have to!' Chen Mu stood, knocking his chair backwards. The tutor raised a hand to calm him but Chen Mu felt tears forming and knew he couldn't let the tutor see these. He ran out of the room.

He curled up beneath the blankets of his bed and cried, as much from frustration as from grief, but when the tutor came to check on him he pretended to be asleep so as not to lose face.

When the tutor left he pulled the blankets off his head and stared at the shadows on the ceiling. He hadn't even been told if the Imperial Almanac had been consulted – if his mother had died on a lucky or unlucky day. Had her soul been brought back from the temple of T'u-ti Lao-yeh? Who had burnt the papers to the ten kings of Hades, and to the god of the dragon chariot to help her soul on its journey through the nether world? Without these pieces of yellow paper from the priests, how could her soul find safe passage to the gates of Paradise?

Then he had another thought which frightened him even as it shamed him – tradition had it that the children of a deceased person should not cut their hair for forty-nine days after the death. He hadn't been told the exact day his mother died, but he had to have cut his queue
after
his mother's death. So now it was more important than ever that he perform his duties for her soul.

But even as he thought this he knew that there was nothing he could do. Xi Tang had nicknamed him well – he felt like a mouse in a trap, and slowly grief turned to anger. He swore never to forgive the Mission for not allowing him to return home.

When he woke next morning he found someone had placed the white clothes of mourning at the foot of his bed. He threw them across the room – if he couldn't go home, he wouldn't wear them. He put on his American clothes.

4