"I’m not sure if I understand you or not," he said quietly. "But I want to, very much."
She lowered her eyes. They both returned to shifting sand.
Lin focused on the sand trailing from his fingers. It was so hot. The other part of the Ordos, the rocky dirt cut by canyons and shallow steppes, fell away behind them at the bottom of the ridge. This was the dune region of the Ordos, the subdesert called Maowushu. Sand rolled away over the pattern of hills in front of him, rose and fell until it ran into the blinding sky. Lin stared off to the horizon as far as he could. It was hard to believe he was here, at last, in the place he had dreamed of coming for so many years to look for Meiyan. She seemed gone, vanished. And now he sat here talking to another woman. He was not a man who was completely free to engage with a woman, yet this woman-this outside woman… He looked at her. There was something about her. When he was with her he felt happy, excited; when he was apart from her he found himself wanting to be with her again.
But she was a Westerner. What did such a woman take, what did she give? He had heard Western women were superficial, that they were interested in diversion, not love. That they could not be trusted. Was it true with Mo Ai-li? As he considered this he watched his hands, and her hands. With a jolt he saw that they were playing with the sand, in unison, a dangerous physical harmony between them. Did she notice?
Ah. She did. Because suddenly she looked up at him, reddening. "We’d better go back."
He couldn’t stop himself from smiling as he got to his feet. "All right. Zou-ba."
"Mr. Tang," Alice said, reading the name of the yin-yang master off of his card, "I have come to you about the death of someone I love." She glanced around his cluttered reception room. In addition to the stacks of well-thumbed almanacs there was, on every shelf and counter, a bizarre jumble of paper objects meant to serve the dead in the underworld. Small reproductions of horses, grain carts, wine pitchers, rice bowls, stacks of play money, paper clothing and linens, miniature chests and beds and tables, and even tiny models of servants and concubines and family members, all cleverly fashioned and folded and printed in a riot of garish paper colors.
"Mo Ai-li, Interpreter," he read from her card. "This is most uncommon. No waiguoren has ever come to me before. Even among Chinese, only the old ones still come. You are perhaps researching feudal culture?"
"No. I require your services, that’s all."
He raised his scanty white eyebrows and laid her card carefully on his desk, then focused his lidded, rheumy black eyes. "Please explain."
"A woman has just died who was like a mother to me, though she was Chinese and not my real mother. I fear she has not been properly mourned."
"What of her children?"
"One son. He does not follow the old ways."
"Husband?"
"Died a few years ago."
"Eh! A bitterness. But this is a Chinese family. Not your own."
"It’s so…"
"You are not Chinese," he reminded her.
"Yes," she said heavily. "I know."
"Yet you wish to observe the rituals. What about your own ancestors? Do you serve them?"
Alice thought of Horace. This was her Fall-just being born with the Mannegan name. "Yes," she evaded. "I have ancestors." But I need new ones, she thought.
"If you are sure you wish to proceed…" He lifted his shoulders in the classic Chinese attitude of disavowal. "A few questions. At the time of the woman’s death, was an auspicious object placed in her mouth-a pearl, or a coin? Were mirrors placed about her body?"
"I was not present."
He paused, cleared his throat. "Was notice of her death given to the local gods? Was a geomancer engaged to determine the proper siting of her grave?"
"I’m sorry, Master Tang, I don’t know, but I believe none of this was done. She lived in the city-in Beijing. They don’t do these things there anymore." She didn’t want to say aloud what they both also knew: that when people died in the big cities now their bodies were disposed of quickly, quietly, through routine cremation.
"The date of her death, please?"
"July fourteenth." Alice closed her eyes and pictured Meng and Jian. "Her son-he loved her. But I don’t think he will worship her spirit." I could, she thought. I could be the worthy spirit child of Meng Shaowen.
And Lucile Swan too.
Why not? The practice of filial piety was one of the many things about old China she’d always found appealing. She had just never had the right kind of parent. Now, though… She cleared her throat. "Is it possible-may I make this woman my ancestor?"
Avoiding her eyes, Master Tang tented his gnarled fingers and regarded them. "It is sometimes done. But only by Chinese. And always when the departed one is childless. You say she has a son?"
"Yes."
"One must consider him."
She saw Jian in her mind with the open-faced wife, the perfect baby. "He will never follow the rituals."
He pondered. "Xing. I will prepare her ling-pai, the spirit tablet. We will meet again in seven days for the rituals of ci ling and an-zhu, which will call her spirit back to the tablet and then enshrine it in your home. This makes her your ancestor and a part of your family forever. You understand the responsibilities?"
"I do."
"You’ll make regular offerings? You’ll honor her every year on Qing-Ming?"
"I will."
"Good. I will come to your room one week from today. In the meantime, you must go to the temple and complete the bao-miao ritual. This will announce her death to the neighborhood gods. Yet you can’t-you say she lived in Beijing…" He stopped and considered the problem.
"Master Tang, I know nothing, I am an outside person of low intelligence, but may I humbly suggest we use a local temple to the Goddess of Mercy, Guanyin?"
"It will suffice, I suppose." He prepared his inkstone, took up a brush, and with perfect form, despite the swollen joints of his long fingers, wrote a few characters. "The temple address," he said, and pushed it across the desk. "Now. So I can prepare the ling-pai, your friend’s name?"
"Meng Shaowen."
"Which Meng?"
"Mengzi-de Meng, " she clarified, and he wrote the characters down.
"There is one more matter, Mo Ai-li. You must choose some spirit objects to send on to Meng Shaowen. Things that would have meaning to her and ease her life beyond the Yellow Springs. These objects are to be burned in the next seven days, preferably at the intersection of two streets. This is jiao-hun, Calling back the soul. Well?"
She stared helplessly around her at the welter of paper symbols crowding the room.
"I see you do not know. Most people select spirit money, food vessels, wine cups-such things as these."
"Ah," Alice said. She rose and circled the room, scanning the miniature world of flawless, loudly colored paper replicas. For Meng she chose kitchen goods, a tiny chest for wardrobe, and a paper Victrola. Then there was Lucile. The women were connected now in her mind. Every prayer, every ritual, would be for both of them. For Lucile she selected a tiny bed, a pile of paper linens, and a little paper man. He was meant to be wearing old-fashioned Chinese robes, but it could have been the raiment of a priest. It could have been Teilhard.
"These things," she said, and handed them to Master Tang.