I placed the harp in its lacquered case at last with a sigh. The moon had yielded itself to the clouds utterly, and a light rain began to fall. The night’s mood changed; we went into the house. I slept ill.
XII
THE DAWN CAME THIS day under a still, gray sky. The air is heavy with late heat and full of dampness. The child frets, although I can find no sickness in him.
The servant returning to-day from his inquiry at my mother’s house brought word that my father has come. It seems that Wang Da Ma took courage to send him a letter through the professional letter-writer who sits at the temple gate, begging humbly that he come because my mother’s strength does not increase. Day after day she sits in her chamber. She cannot eat. My father, receiving the letter, has come home for two days.
I determined, therefore, to go to see him. I dressed my son in red. It is the first time my father has seen him.
I found my father seated by the pool in the Court of the Goldfish. Since the air was hot, and since he is now exceedingly fat, he sat beside the pool clad only in his inner coat and trousers of summer silk, pale as the water under the willows. The Second Lady stood beside him fanning him, although the perspiration rolled down her own cheeks from the unaccustomed exertion; and on his knees sat one of his children in gala dress for his return.
When I entered the court he clapped his hands and cried,
“Aha — aha — here comes the mother and her son!”
He set his child from his knee and bade my son approach, enticing him in a low voice and with smiles. I bowed deeply and he nodded, his eyes still fixed on my son. Then I folded my son’s hands and bade him bow. My father was greatly pleased.
“Aha — aha—” he kept repeating softly. He lifted my son to his knee and felt his round arms and legs, and laughed at his wide, astonished eyes.
“Such a man!” he cried in delight. “Let a slave bring sweetmeats for him! Let the candied persimmons be brought, and the little larded cakes!”
I was dismayed. My child has but ten teeth at best. How then could he eat candied persimmons?
“O my honored father!” I begged. “Consider his tender years. His little stomach is used only to soft food. I beg you—”
But my father waved his hand to silence me and talked to the child. I was compelled to submit.
“But you are a man! And does your mother still feed you on pap? My daughter, I have had sons also — many sons, four or five? — I cannot remember. At any rate, I know more about sons than the mother of only one, even of such an one!” He rumbled a great laugh and continued, “Ah, if my son, your brother, but breeds me such a one as this by the daughter of Li to worship my old bones!”
Since he had mentioned my brother I was emboldened to ask,
“But if he weds a foreigner, my father? It is this fear which wastes away my mother’s heart until she is day by day weaker in body.”
“Pst! He cannot,” he replied lightly. “How can he wed without my consent? It is not legal. Your mother is needlessly agitated over this whole affair. I have said to her this very morning,
“‘Cease your foolish fretting. Let the lad play with his foreigner. He is twenty-four years old, and his blood urges him. It is nothing. At his age I had three singing girls whom I loved. Let him have his pleasure. When he wearies of her — say, in two moons or, if she be really a beauty, in four or five, perhaps, although I do not expect that — he will settle the more readily to his marriage. Can it be supposed that he will live a monk for four years, even though he is in a foreign country? Are not foreign women yet women?’
“But your mother has ever been incomprehensible. From the very first she has been possessed by some strange intensity. Nay, I do not speak ill of her. She is wise, and under her hands my gold and silver is not carelessly spent. I do not complain. She never lashes about me with her tongue as some women do. There are times when I wish she would, so that I be not met with this silence that baffled me even in the beginning. Oh, it is nothing now — it does not matter. No one understands the caprices of women. But since her youth she has had this fault, a gravity too intense for ease in daily life. She seizes upon some thought, some imagined duty, and then that becomes life itself to her. It is very trying—”
He broke off his speech in an irritation I had never seen in him before. He took the fan from the hand of the Second Lady and began fanning himself sharply. He set my son on the ground and seemed to forget him. He went on almost in anger,
“And now she has some strange woman’s fancy that our son’s first union should produce a grandson for us — a superstitious idea that the child will thereby be more gifted of heaven. Ah, women are willful! And the best of them are ignorant, having been shut away from the world.”
He closed his eyes and fanned himself in silence for a few moments, and his irritation passed away. His usual look of peaceful, smiling good humor came over his face. He opened his eyes and pressed cakes upon my son, saying,
“Eat, my little one! What does it all matter? Do not fret yourself, my daughter. Can a son disobey his father and live? I cannot be troubled.”
Still was I not content, and after a silence, I had more that must be spoken.
“But, my father, if he refuse to marry his betrothed? I have heard that in these changed times—”
But my father would have none of it. He waved his hand lightly and smiled.
“Refuse? I have not heard anywhere that a son may refuse his father. Calm yourself, my daughter. A year from now he will have begot a son according to the law, by the daughter of Li. Such a one as thou, my little man!”
And he patted my son’s cheek.
I told my husband what my father had said, and he heard and replied thoughtfully,
“The trouble in all this may be that the foreigner is not willing to accept a subordinate position. It is not customary in their country for men to have secondary wives.”
I had nothing to say in immediate answer. It had not occurred to me to think of her or what she would think of our customs. Had she not succeeded in enticing my brother? What more then could she desire? I had thought thus far only of my brother and of his duty to his parents.
“You mean she would expect to be my brother’s only wife all her days?” I asked.
I was even a little indignant. How could she expect to forbid my brother what was his legal right according to the law of his country? How could she demand more of him than my honored mother had demanded of my father? I told my husband this.
“It is very simple, I think,” I said in conclusion. “If she marries a man of our race, she must give him the freedom to which he is accustomed. She cannot bring her foreign ways here.”
My husband looked at me and smiled most curiously. I could not understand him. Then he spoke,
“Suppose I said that I wished to take a small wife — a concubine?”
Something cold smote me like snow thrust into my bare bosom. I whispered,
“Oh, no, my lord — you never could — not now! I have given you a son!”
He leaped to his feet, and I felt his arm about my shoulders. He was murmuring,
“No, no, my little heart — I do not mean that — I would not — could not, indeed—”
But his other words had been too sudden. They are the words which many a wife fears and even expects, but I had not, since he loved me. Now without warning he had driven into my heart all the anguish of my mother and the anguish of a hundred generations of women who loved their lords and lost their favor. I fell to sudden weeping that I could not control.
Then my husband comforted me, holding my hands and murmuring — but I cannot tell you his words, My Sister. Spoken again even between us they would shame me. I am made shy when I think of them. They were love made most exquisite. My weeping stilled itself, and I was comforted.