There was also a small bouquet of jasmine flowers on the table.
Four or five kids were gathered in the center of the room, some playing pipa, some plugging sanxian, seemingly oblivious of his intrusion. He wondered whether there was a class going on at the moment.
“I’m staying at the Southern Garden Hotel. It’s so close, and I’m interested in Suzhou opera.” He decided not to ask about Qian straight off. “Do I have to pay a fee?”
“No, you don’t. This is not an opera house, and we don’t sell tickets. But if you want to buy a cup of tea, or a buy a CD, you are most welcome.”
“A cup of tea first,” he said, choosing a fairly expensive one, Hairy Point, for thirty yuan. “I’ve never been to a Suzhou opera club before.”
“It’s not like the club in your hotel, Southern Heavenly World, that much I can tell you. And I’m glad you’re interested in opera. By the way, my name is Nan.”
“No, I’m not interested in that kind of nightclub. And my name is Qiang,” Chen said, thinking of Qian again.
“Look around and enjoy yourself,” she said, pouring out a cup of tea for him. “If you have any questions, just ask. The kids will start singing soon.”
“Thanks.”
He seated himself on a mahogany chair by the windows. On the tea table, there was something like a menu, from which a visitor could choose songs or episodes, each with a price listed next to it. It wasn’t expensive at all. The mere fact that there was such a club at such a desirable location seemed nothing short of a miracle.
“I have a question for you, Nan. How do you manage to keep this club open?”
“Well, Suzhou opera enjoys a long tradition in this city. I grew up in a family of opera fans, listening to it all the time from my earliest memories on. When my parents passed away, they left these rooms to me. Alone, I didn’t need all that space, so I’ve converted it for the club after the opera theaters were all torn down in recent years. Like me, some other people were sad to see the local opera go into decline like that, so they help in whatever way possible. But it’s been really tough to keep the club going.”
“I imagine it’s not easy, maintaining this oasis in the midst of our materialistic society.”
“Usually, the members of the club meet to sing two or three times a week, and nonmembers come to listen and enjoy, buying a cup of tea or a CD as a sort of donation,” Nan said wistfully. “Suzhou opera is losing its audience, especially among young people. So we keep the place open for the kids to come by after school, and the instruments are left out so that the children can play them.”
“That’s something really worth doing,” Chen said, nodding. People came here to the club because of their passion for the traditional art, despite all the entertainment available on TV and the Internet. “Not everyone knows how to appreciate a slow pace. Describing Suzhou opera, a friend always used the well-known example of the one that features a young girl walking downstairs, lost in an internal monologue; it can take as many as eighteen episodes for her to reach the last step.”
“Yes, that’s from the Pearl Pagoda. You can see why times are really hard for Suzhou opera, with its narratives unfolding so slowly in a society that moves so fast,” she said with a wan smile. “In the evening, we’ll have an informal performance of short pieces. It’s free, and anybody may come. Of course, you may want to buy another cup of tea. We won’t refuse any donations from people who love Suzhou opera.”
A girl, maybe twelve or thirteen, stepped over to the opera table, carrying a pipa taller than herself. After bowing to an invisible audience, she started singing.
To Chen’s surprise, it was an eleventh-century ci poem written by Su Shi, titled “Lines Written in Dinghui Temple, Huangzhou”:
The waning moon hangs on the sparse tung twigs, / the night deep, silent. / An apparition of a solitary wild goose / glides in the dark. // Startled, it turns back, / its sorrow unknown to others. / Trying each of the chilly boughs, / it chooses not to perch. / Freezing, the maple leaves fall / over the Wu River.
He heaved a sigh. He thought that was one of the songs included on Qian’s CD. What was going through her mind while she practiced those lines?
Chen applauded as the girl finished singing. Fifteen years ago, Qian might have been just like her.
He turned to Nan. “What a beautiful piece! I think I’ve also heard it on one of the club’s CDs, sang by someone named Qian. Do you happen to know her?”
“Qian-” Nan said, looking up in surprise. “Why?”
“I met her a short while ago, and she said she sometimes comes to the club.”
“You should have come-” Nan murmured, her eyes suddenly filling with tears.
“What do you mean?”
“She died last night.”
“What!” The news hit like a personal blow.
“Someone broke into her apartment, killed her, and took all her valuables.”
He had suspected something had gone terribly wrong when he had tried to call her from the phone booth and a strange man answered. He was shocked speechless for a minute or two.
A robbery gone wrong? He ruled it out instinctively-it was just too convenient. And the robbery-murder theory certainly didn’t explain the man waiting in her apartment, answering her cell phone. But he wasn’t in any position to contact the Suzhou police bureau about it.
“You look pale,” Nan said. “It’s a shock to all of us. Were you close?”
“I didn’t know her well, but she helped me,” he murmured. “Please tell me more about what happened.”
“No one here knows any details yet. Yesterday afternoon, she came here to the club and paid her monthly membership fee, as always. After she left, some visitors came to the club. They bought her CD, and one of them even bought a copy of her poster, which cost two hundred yuan. After they left, I called her. She was pleased, saying that the money the visitors spent would be her donation to the club.”
“I don’t understand how thieves could have broken into her apartment,” Chen said. “Her apartment is close to the Temple Market, near the center of the city.”
“I don’t know. All I know is that early this morning, while I was still asleep, the cops came to my place. They found me because my number was in her phone’s call log as the last person that contacted her yesterday. The cops asked me a bunch of questions before telling me that she’d been murdered.”
“That must have been awful for you.”
“We’re having a memorial performance for her tonight. We’re performing all the Tang and Song poems that she set to Suzhou opera tunes. It’s our way to remember her. You should come.”
Nan then walked over to a pipa leaning against the wall.
“That’s hers.”
He followed her, reached out to the instrument, and noticed that one of the strings was broken. In ancient China, a broken string was a sinister omen. Touching it, he imagined her playing pipa here, one string, one peg, each reminiscent of the lost years of her youth.
“I’m so sorry I can’t come to the performance tonight,” he said. He thought it was likely that some plainclothes policeman would also be at the evening performance. “I have an important business meeting tonight. But I would like to buy a CD of hers and order a short piece called ‘Zijuan Lamenting at Night’ for tonight’s memorial performance. I’ll pay the fee for the song in accordance to the menu.”
Zijuan was a maid to Daiyu, the heroine of Dream of the Red Chamber. After Daiyu’s death, Zijuan laments the heroine’s tragic fate on the night when Baoyu, the hero, marries another girl.