To sort my earrings, bracelets and necklaces, my eunuch got up before dawn. He laid out the combs, pins, strings, scented-oil bottles and hair boards. I heard him filling up the washbasin and thought that maybe I should stop talking about An-te-hai so much.
In Li Lien-ying's hands I became a work of art. My dress was "moonlight on snow," embroidered with a silver turnip pattern, and my new hairstyle was a "piled-up jewelry cake."
Rong came with her husband, Prince Ch'un. The family had grown to more than thirty people. I hadn't seen my sister for a long time and noticed changes in her. Her back was hunched and her belly stuck out. Wearing the Manchu four-inch platform shoes, she walked with a drunkard's steps. A large jade hair board was fastened on the back of her head. The centerpiece was a jade grasshopper. Her teeth protruded so badly they looked as if they were flying out of her mouth. Infected gums made her jaws puffy. One side of her face was visibly bigger than the other.
Rong started criticizing me the moment she arrived. She was loud and animated. Warned by Prince Ch'un of her deteriorating mental condition, I tried to ignore her.
The royal brothers sat down together. Prince Kung, Prince Ch'un and Prince Ts'eng showed little affection for one another. They sat in silence smoking pipes.
My brother, Kuei Hsiang, arrived drunk. His wife wore a hair board with ornaments piled up like a pagoda. Since she could hardly turn her head, she talked while her eyes rolled from side to side.
Emperor Guang-hsu, now seventeen, looked handsome and confident in a sunlight-colored silk robe. He had made it clear to the royal clan that he wouldn't take more than one Empress and two concubines. I gave him my support.
By now I was familiar with the unique ways of boys raised as the Son of Heaven. They lived inside their heads. For Tung Chih, living had meant escaping himself. For Guang-hsu it meant denying his own humanity, for he believed that it was pleasure that had destroyed Tung Chih.
The list of choices for the new Empress was long. The royal clan spent days in discussion. Finally my brother's twenty-year-old daughter, Lan, was nominated.
My room became dark after the sun set. The eunuchs came and added coal to the heaters. Guang-hsu and I sat facing each other. He let me know that he wasn't keen on getting married. I convinced him that in order to claim himself as an adult and officially mount the throne, he must first get married.
"I can't afford to waste time," he complained. "But wasting time is mostly what I do!"
"What do you think of your cousin Lan?" I asked.
"What about her?"
"She is plain," I said, "but character-wise, she is well versed in art, literature and music."
"If she is your choice," Guang-hsu said, "she will be mine."
"She is three years older than you and perhaps more mature. She might not strike your fancy, but you grew up together and you know each other. It is you, however, who must choose."
"We get along." Guang-hsu's face turned red. "I have seen her paintings, although I don't really feel as if I know her."
"She would like very much to be your Empress."
"Has she really said that?" Guang-hsu asked.
I nodded.
"Well, that's nice…" He hesitated and rose from his chair. "I suppose she is the right one, then. You like her, and that's what matters to me."
"Do you mind Lan's lack of beauty?"
"Why should I mind?"
"Most men would."
"I am not most men."
"Well, both of you are not only my closest blood relations but also people I can truly trust. However, I would not be able to forgive myself if matching you two led to unhappiness."
Guang-hsu went quiet. After a while he said, "In my eyes Lan is beautiful and has always been kind."
I began to relax and felt hopeful.
"Within the family," Guang-hsu continued, "Lan was the one who always protected me when others ridiculed me."
"You are not doing this to please me, are you, Guang-hsu?"
"It would be dishonest to deny that I intend to please you," he said. "I don't think I am allowed to postpone my marriage, since I have already postponed it twice. The world thinks that the reason I am not married is because you refuse to step down."
I was moved by his concern for me. I said nothing, but my eyes grew tearful-I lost Tung Chih but gained Guang-hsu.
"Mother, let's just get it over with. If there is any chance that I shall fall in love, Lan would be the one."
Now I felt nervous and asked Guang-hsu to give himself a few months to think about Lan before making a final decision.
We walked along the shore of Kun Ming Lake where the view was serene. Shrouded in mist, the hills looked like a giant watercolor painting, and the rippling lake reminded me of watered silk.
I sighed when Tung Chih came to mind. "I wished that I had known how to please Alute."
"Let me make you happy again, Mother," Guang-hsu said softly.
The Big Dipper hung bright in the purple sky. That night Li Lien-ying applied green-tea-enriched dandelion cream on my skin and massaged my limbs. Something unsettling had descended over me, but I couldn't figure out what it was. In the future I would wish that I had continued my conversation with Guang-hsu.
I could only say that it was exactly what life was about: a mystery in which one can never know where one truly is.
23
Guang-hsu chose two sisters from the Tatala clan-which had close connections to the Yehonala clan-as his concubines. The girls were favorite students of Tutor Weng. Guang-hsu first heard his grand tutor praising them, and then was impressed when he met them. The girls' father was the secretary of the Imperial Board of Justice, a friend of Prince Kung's who was known for his liberal views.
I didn't quite know how to react when Guang-hsu presented the girls to me. The younger one, Zhen, or Pearl, was barely fourteen years old. She was beautiful and acted more like Guang-hsu's younger sister than his concubine. Pearl was curious, bright and vivacious. The elder girl, Chin, or Lustrous, was fifteen. She was rotund with a placid but stiff expression. Guang-hsu seemed happy with his selection and asked for my approval.
Although there were a number of girls who came highly recommended, and who in my opinion were much better qualified in terms of beauty and intelligence, I promised myself not to interfere with Guang-hsu's decisions. I was a little selfish and thought that the less attractive the girls, the safer it would be for my niece Lan. I would be doing Lan a disservice by surrounding her husband with beauties. Despite my prayers that Guang-hsu and Lan would eventually fall in love, I asked myself, what if they don't?
Pearl and Lustrous completed a harmonious package. When I lined them up with Lan, I thought the arrangement ideaclass="underline" Pearl was young, Lustrous was passive, and Lan was given a chance to shine. My goal was to encourage Guang-hsu to have children with all of them.
The three girls came for tea in beautiful dresses. They reminded me of my youth. I intended to let them know of my regrettable relationship with Alute. The girls didn't expect my frankness and were stunned.
"I am sorry to put you through this," I explained. "If you don't already know the story, you will hear it sooner or later from palace rumors. It's better that I tell you my own version."
I warned them to put aside their expectations of life inside the Forbidden City. "Don't focus on how life should be but how life is." I let Lan know that I was thrilled to share with her a passion for literature and opera, but I cautioned her that poetry and opera are diversions, not serious pursuits.
The girls didn't seem to understand, but each nodded obediently.
"Alute and Tung Chih fell in love the first time they met," I went on. "But Tung Chih abandoned her after a few months for other women." I mentioned how I lost my husband to Chinese concubines. "It takes character, an iron will and endurance to survive inside the Forbidden City." To make my point clear, I emphasized that I would not tolerate another Alute.