Oh, sometimes I hate the foreigner because she holds utterly in the palm of her hand my brother’s heart! I longed to go at once to my mother, but my brother begged me to await her summons. My husband also commanded me to wait, since if I went it would seem to be against my brother, and now that he is eating our rice, this would be discourteous. I had therefore no recourse except in patience — poor food for an anxious heart, My Sister!
And thus matters remain with us.
Yesterday I was glad when Mrs. Liu came to see us. We had spent a difficult day, remembering the day before when my mother had been angered with my brother, so that their meeting bore no fruit except disappointment. My brother had hung about the rooms, scarcely speaking to anyone, and staring out of the window. If he picked up a book to read it, he threw it down quickly and chose another, only to put that away as quickly.
The foreigner, after observing him thus, withdrew into her own thoughts over a small book of her own. I busied myself with my son that I need not be about them. But so heavy was the disappointment about the house that the cheerfulness of my husband coming in at noon for his rice scarcely lightened my brother’s gloom, or broke the foreigner’s stillness. Therefore when in the afternoon Mrs. Liu came in, it was like a cool fresh wind blowing through the dull, sullen heat of a summer’s day.
My brother’s wife was seated with her book in her hand, held carelessly, as though she were half-dreaming over it. She stared a little at Mrs. Liu. We have had no visitors since my brother came; our friends have known of our difficult situation and have not come through delicacy, and we have invited no one, because we do not know how to introduce the foreigner. I call her my brother’s wife in courtesy to him, and yet legally she is without position until my father and my mother recognize her.
But Mrs. Liu was wholly untroubled. She seized the foreigner’s hand, and the two soon talked easily, and they even laughed. I do not know what they said, since they spoke in English. But the foreigner seemed suddenly awake, and I watched her, surprised at the change. She has these two selves, one silent, remote, even a little somber, and the other this gayety, which yet seems too intense for joy. Watching them I disliked Mrs. Liu for a little while because she seemed careless of the difficulty of our position. But when she rose to go she pressed my hand, and she said in our own language,
“I am sorry. It is hard for everyone.”
She turned and said something to the other one, something which made her dark blue eyes suddenly silvery with tears. We stood and looked at each other then, the three of us, each hesitating on speech, when without warning the foreign one turned and went swiftly from the room. Mrs. Liu watched her, her face full of quiet pity.
“It is very hard for everyone,” she repeated. “Is the affair between the two happy?”
Since she is frank like my husband, I answered without pretense,
“There is love between my brother and that one, but my mother is dying of her disappointment. You know how frail she is at best, now, as age comes on her.”
She sighed and shook her head.
“I know — ah, yes, I see it often now. These are ruthless days for the old. There is no compromise possible between old and young. They are as clearly divided as though a new knife severed a branch from a tree.”
“It is very wrong,” I said in a low voice.
“Not wrong,” she replied, “only inevitable. And that is the saddest thing in the world.”
While we waited, therefore, helpless for a sign of what to do, I could not forget my mother. I pondered what Mrs. Liu had said, that these were sorrowful days for the aged, and to ease myself I said,
“I will take my son to visit his father’s parents. They also are aged and longing.”
My heart was softened to all those who are old. I dressed my son then in his long satin coat like his father’s. On his first birthday we had bought him a hat like a man’s, of black velvet, fitting his head closely, and with a red button on top. This I placed on his head. I touched his chin, his cheeks, and his forehead with a brush dipped in vermilion. When he was ready, he was so beautiful that I was frightened lest the gods consider that he was too lovely for a human being and be moved to destroy him.
And so his grandmother thought when she saw him. She lifted him against her, and her round cheeks shook with pleasure and laughter. She smelled his fragrant flesh, and she said again and again in a sort of ecstasy,
“Ah, my little one — ah, my son’s son!”
I was moved by her emotion and reproached myself that I had not brought him more often to her. I could not regret that we had taken him for ourselves; this was part of that inevitable of which Mrs. Liu spoke. But I was sorry for anyone who must grow old without his continual presence. I stood smiling therefore as she adored the child. Then she looked at him afresh and said quickly, turning his face from side to side with her hands upon his cheeks,
“But what is this? You have done nothing to protect him from the gods! What carelessness is this?” Then turning to the slaves she cried, “Bring a gold earring and a needle!”
I had thought before this that I ought to pierce his left ear and place a gold ring in it to deceive the gods into thinking him a girl and useless to them. It is an ancient device against early death for an only son. But you know, My Sister, how tender is his flesh; my own flesh shrank in pain for him even now, although I dared not dispute my mother-in-law’s wisdom.
But when she had placed the needle against the lobe of his tiny ear he cried out, and his eyes grew large with fear, and he drew his mouth down, so that his grandmother seeing it could not go on, and she dropped the needle. Then murmuring to him she called for a bit of red silk thread, and with that she tied the ring about his ear without piercing his flesh. Then he smiled, and his smile caught our hearts together.
Seeing what my son is to his grandmother I came away understanding yet more fully the pain of my mother. The fruit of her life is her grandson who is not yet born.
But I am happy that I made glad the heart of my son’s grandmother, and I am eased a little of my grief for the aged.
The gods are pleased that I was filial and took the child yesterday to his father’s mother, My Sister, for this morning a messenger came to us with a letter from my mother. It was addressed to my brother, and it said nothing of their angry words; it simply commanded my brother to come home. She said that she would take no further responsibility about the foreigner. The matter was too great for her. It must be decided by our father and by the male heads of the clan.
But meanwhile, she said, my brother could bring her home with him, and she could live in the outer court. It would not be fitting to have her mingle with the concubines and the children. Then the letter ended.
We were all astonished at the change in my mother’s mind. My brother was at once altogether hopeful. He exclaimed over and over again with smiles,
“I knew she could give up her determination in the end! After all, I am her only son!”
When I reminded him that in no sense had she accepted the foreigner he replied,
“Once she is within the gates everyone will love her.”
I said nothing then, since I did not wish to discourage him. But in my heart I knew that we Chinese women do not love others so easily. It is more likely that the women will remember the daughter of Li who waits for the consummation of her marriage.
I questioned secretly the messenger from my mother, and he replied that during the previous night my mother had been very ill so that they all feared that even at that moment she might pass over into the abode of the dead. But they caused prayers to be said and priests to be called, and she was better, and by the morning she had miraculously recovered sufficiently to write the letter with her own hand.