Title: Hanging Waters (1933)
Author: Keith West (pseudonym of Kenneth Westmacott Lane) (1893-1954)
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Title: Hanging Waters (1933)
Author: Keith West (pseudonym of Kenneth Westmacott Lane) (1893-1954))


TO
AH KAM



CONTENTS:

I.      Uncle Tung Lai Luk
II.     Mother-Wisdom
III.    Idyll
IV.     The Sorcerer
V.      A Bargain
VI.     The Temple of Memory
VII.    Borrowed Philosophy of a Poet
VIII.   Bottom, Thou Art Translated
IX.     Oars in the Twilight
X.      "The Happy Heart"
XI.     The Bearer of a Noble Name
XII.    Tragi-Comedy
XIII.   To Lie like a Gentleman
XIV.    Future and Past
XV.     Their Strength is to Sit Still
XVI.    An Old Fairy-tale
XVII.   News and a Dream
XVIII.  The Literary Method
XIX.    Sleuth
XX.     Dried Fish
XXI.    Views of a Crime
XXII.   Scena
XXIII.  The Black Box
XXIV.   The Honest Brigand
XXV.    Po Feng Hsi loses his Temper
XXVI.   The Mouse-trap and the Tiger
XXVII.  The Odyssey of an Optimist
XXVIII. How to Make a Widow
XXIX.   Three Problems
XXX.    Doves of Experience
XXXI.   You Again?
XXXII.  Second Attempt
XXXIII. Tale of a Hat
XXXIV.  In Accordance with the Criminal Code
XXXV.   Hanging Waters

* * * * *



CHAPTER I UNCLE TUNG LAI LUK


"IT is a pity," said Ming So, squatting on his heels on the raised
embankment, "that the sides of this paddy-field are not in line with the
points of the compass, for if they were we might expect a better yield
of rice."

His mother halted the water-buffalo and gave a further roll up to each
of her trouser-legs.

"What man told you that?" she demanded. Then, without waiting for an
answer, she raised one foot and splashed the water-buffalo. The signal
moved the animal, the animal moved the wooden plough, and Ming Nai waded
on across the paddy-field, the handles of the plough in her unswerving
grip. Her son saw her turn at the far end. As she passed him again, she
added, "Because he is no wiser than you are, my son." This time she did
not even stop the plough as she passed.

Ming So remained squatting on the raised embankment which held the
precious water in the paddy-field. By and by, to-morrow if not to-day,
he would have to bucket water into that paddy-field--a work of
considerable monotony, whose results were not immediately obvious.
Therefore an unsatisfying piece of work. To-day, or to-morrow, or the
week after--it did not matter much. His mother finished the few
remaining mud-furrows, tethered the animal to a stake on the flat,
raised bank, dragged the primitive plough to dry land, and came towards
him.

"What man told you of the points of the compass?" she demanded.

"It was Pai Kwat, the schoolmaster," Ming So told her as he rose to his
feet and trotted along beside her, homewards. "He is a very great man,
is Pai Kwat. He knows all that there is to learn of Feng Sui--the
Science of Favourable Aspects--besides a great deal of other learning
of which I have not plucked a single blade. He is a great man, is Pai
Kwat. His voice tells his greatness to those who have the intelligence
to observe. You have heard the booming note with which he instructs the
children in the village school?"

"Drums also boom, and drums are empty," said his mother succinctly. "No,
my son, you are too ready to listen with attention to loud noises
without duly considering their meaning. Of course, your dead father had
the same fault, so that you probably inherit it from him. If your father
had thought less of Feng Sui, in the matter of selecting his grave,
there would be less need, now, for me to guide that foolish beast along
uncounted furrows in our paddy-field. To buy land for his grave at the
ridiculous rate which he paid for it, just because the land was supposed
to be lucky! Why, when men are dead, they all look the same." She
laughed quietly to herself. "And smell the same, wherever their grave
may chance to be," she added.

"But when people die," persisted the boy, "is it not of the highest
importance where their graves may be? Does not the eternal comfort of
the dead man's soul depend on the forethought which he or his family
expend on the choice of a suitable burial place? The honourable teacher,
Pai Kwat, tells many tales of evil which has befallen a family because
they did not pay due attention to Feng Sui."

Ming Nai snorted impatiently.

"Pai Kwat! Pai Kwat! Who is this Pai Kwat that his tales should deplete
a widow's money-box? What does he know of anything except the
over-praised wisdom of the ancients and the contents of his musty books?
Now, if you ask me for the name of a wise man, I would mention your
uncle, the honourable Tung Lai Luk, who is favouring our unworthy
household with his presence to-day. There is a man for you, if you like!
No nonsense about the tales of the ancients. Still, you have seen only
thirteen winters, so that we must not yet expect from you the ripe
judgment of your elders."

The boy skipped delightedly.

"To-day he is coming? I thought it was tomorrow." He left her side for a
moment in fruitless pursuit of a water-rat. When the ripples of its dive
had subsided, he returned. "And this great uncle of ours, why is he so
great and wise a man? Has he learning, or money?"

"He possesses the learning which brings money, my son, and the money
which that learning brings. He does not mistake to-day for to-morrow,
nor noise for importance."

"I shall be very attentive when my uncle comes," said the boy. "It is
possible to learn much by observation, and he must truly be a great man
for you to say so." Thus he paid an almost unconscious tribute to his
mother's critical faculties. "And I, who am the head of the family of
Ming, have much need of knowledge if that family is to assume again its
merited importance."

She said nothing to this, and presently they came to the small
mud-walled house which was home. The poverty of the family had not
prevented a certain neatness in the unambitious building: the two
sleeping-rooms were as spotless as the one living-room, and even the
kitchen at the rear exhibited an order quite unusual in a Chinese
kitchen. Yet, even so, Ming Nai was not satisfied. Having washed the mud
of the paddy-field from her legs, she set about a last and largely
superfluous sweeping of the tiled floor, while Ming So, slicing beans
into a basin, reflected on the mixed blessing of an uncle's visit. This
was his mother's brother, he mused. Why, then, should his mother strive
to make the house appear cleaner than it ought to be? His mother's
brother would know, being a wise man, that this tidiness was abnormal.
But then, he also would know, being a wise man, that women are happiest
when they seem to achieve perfection in the ordinary course of their
duties, claiming (silently, of course) praise for the presumed
permanency of this uncomfortable and unreal state.

Ming So sliced beans, while his mother swept and garnished. And by and
by a carrying-chair set down at the devil-stopper outside the door. He
heard an uncomplimentary remark from one of the coolies who had borne
the chair, comparing the smallness of the house with the expected tip
from Uncle Tung Lai Luk. Then his uncle had arrived, and Ming So, as
titular head of the household, had secreted the beans in a cupboard and
was bowing with a dignity beyond his years in the middle of the
living-room.

"This is an honour of which even my mother is not worthy," he was
saying, "much less myself."

Tung Lai Luk, the very picture of a successful business man whose
stocky, unimaginative form had thrust through difficulties and
(possibly) dangers, stood smiling, as a visiting uncle should smile, at
the dignified figure of his little nephew. Behind him a coolie had
deposited two black, shiny suitcases. Tung's small black skull-cap,
decorated with a button of the third order of Mandarins, to which he was
not entitled, nodded as if to say that here was all he could possibly
have hoped for or expected.

"I, myself, am unduly honoured," he said, as custom prescribes--albeit
he used the phrase as if he were fully aware of its emptiness. "And your
honourable mother?" he demanded.

At the words Ming Nai came from the smaller bedroom. Her hair had been
freshly braided, she wore her best pair of black trousers, and her hands
were folded in front of her as she stood, head bowed, awaiting her
brother's permission to speak. For Ming Nai, despite her very
clear-sighted ideas on the relations between men and women, played a
part because she sought from this brother of hers, whom she despised not
a little as a pompous gas-bag, advancement for her only son, Ming So. It
was possible that he might offer to take the boy away with him to the
distant city, there to give him that opportunity for advancement which
she herself could not hope to provide.

"You are well, my sister?" asked Tung Lai Luk.

"As well as circumstances and the perpetual mud of the paddy-field
permits," she replied. "But I have no right to complain, possessing as I
do a brother who honours our roof with a visit, and a son who will be
able to perform the ancestral duties at the tombs of his fathers. But do
you come into our home and treat it as your own," she added, remembering
what she wanted from her brother.

The coolies brought in the suitcases and put them down, looking askance
at the coin which the merchant proffered. Ming So moved a chair into
what he wished to appear a more convenient position. Ming Nai retired to
the kitchen.

      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *

Night had not so much surrounded the little house as engulfed it--night
with its spaced jewels hung in the branches of the nearly
invisible trees--while a faint wind stirred small rustles under the
door and round the eaves of the house. Uncle Tung Lai Luk had been fed
and was now sitting on a porcelain barrel at one side of the table,
while at the other side little Ming So valiantly played host and his
mother put in an edged word when opportunity offered.

"And now," said Tung Lai Luk, "now that the familiarity fitting and
decent between relations has begun to displace the formality fitting and
decent between newly-met relations, may I enquire, sister, what you mean
to do with this young nephew of mine?"

"Do with him?" Ming Nai almost forgot, in her delight that the subject
had at last come under discussion, the deference due to her brother. "Do
with him? What can I do with him? My eyesight is yet sharp enough to see
that, here in the little village of Ha Foo, there is no suitable
occupation for a boy of thirteen summers, no path wherein he may
profitably walk, no goal towards which he may profitably strive. There
are but the poor paddy-fields which the honoured and lamented father of
Ming So did not sell in order to provide for fitting obsequies. Behind
the plough, after the wooden harrow, as the proverb says, birds may
profit, but seldom men."

Tung Lai Luk nodded his head in comprehension, passing without comment
over his sister's too great outspokenness.

"I know," he agreed. "For some moons, now, I have been considering the
future of the lad, so far as my weightier business matters have
permitted, and as the result of this exercise of forethought I do not
think, sister, that you overstate the effect on the mind of a sensible
boy of the monotony, the depressingly small returns, of our deplorably
elementary methods of rice-culture. The paddy-field is not a suitable
place for your son, my sister, nor for my nephew."

Ming Nai nodded in her turn.

"Your wisdom is, as ever, the _wisdom of jade_, and I daily return
thanks to the ancestors of the Ming family for having permitted my son
to have so excellent an uncle." She felt more or less confident, now,
that Tung Lai Luk would make some proposal or other about the boy. "It
is generous of you to spare the time to consider his plight."

"He is an intelligent boy," said Tung Lai Luk, "I presume that he has
duly studied the classics--that he knows by heart the words of the
Master, Confucius?"

"His teacher, the honourable Pai Kwat, has often spoken of the progress
which the boy has been making," assented Ming Nai, without specifying
the matter of Pai Kwat's remarks.

Her brother did not misunderstand her, however. "We must remember that
even learning may be deceptive," he said. "The wisest often impress
their teachers little. Now, I have a proposition to make."

Ming Nai leaned forward. The moments for which she had been waiting had
arrived. Ming So opened his mouth in apparent surprise, as his mother
had told him to do whenever his mother nudged him with her foot.

Tung Lai Luk drew his chair slightly nearer to the chairs of Ming Nai
and Ming So.



CHAPTER II MOTHER-WISDOM


"OPPORTUNITIES should be embraced with both hands," began Tung Lai Luk
sententiously. "Now, in this land of paddy-fields there are few
opportunities to embrace, and, if there are few opportunities, it is not
to be expected that a boy like my nephew should prosper as is his
undoubted right." He paused. "In the city, however, it is different.
There, we find men of all sorts, and opportunities as many and as varied
as the men. Do you not agree with me, my sister?"

Ming Nai saw that, given time, he would come to the point, so she said:
"You are as right as may be."

Thus flattered, Tung proceeded: "It is impossible for him to go to the
city without having a position to which to proceed. I very much doubt if
the gains which you, my sister, wrest from an unkind and reluctant land
would provide enough funds to keep the boy in Kwei Sek for a single
week. Therefore we must consider how a position for him may be found."

Ming So nodded at his uncle's wisdom.

"It is only the opportunity which is necessary," he said. "Given the
opportunity, I should find little difficulty in taking due advantage of
it."

"Do not be too confident," replied his uncle. "It is one thing to have a
plan and quite another thing to put that plan into execution. Now the
plan which I have formed for you (after much consideration--and, I may
say, much misgiving) necessitates an application, an industry on your
part which you will find difficult of attainment. Remember that work,
really hard work, is not always as pleasant as sitting on the banks of a
paddy-field; that to rise with the sun and go again to rest long after
the sun's setting, calls for determination in one who has seen thirteen
winters only. Remember that."

"I will do my best," answered the boy, not particularly depressed at the
thought of the life of toil suggested by his uncle's words. He was
trying to imagine what might be the nature of the promised opportunity.
In his uncle's office? A clerk? Surely not. What then?

"He is a good boy at times," ventured his mother guardedly.

Tung Lai Luk heaved the sigh of a man whose breast is full of important
matters.

"I will take him into my house," he said. "Of course, at his tender age
he can expect to receive only his food: I will, however, add to that
some small money for such foolishness as boys are accustomed to find
desirable. You, my sister, will doubtless be able and ready to provide
him with a sufficiency of clothes to equip him for residence in such a
household as mine."

"Clothes are unbelievably expensive," returned Ming Nai. "Nevertheless,
I will make an effort to provide him with what may be needful. For,
indeed, so generous and unexpected an offer calls for me, in my turn, to
do something for the boy. We are grateful, he and I, and I hope that
you, my honourable brother, will not fail to understand how grateful we
are." At the back of her mind she was thinking that the old miser might
at least have given the boy his clothes. It would mean skimping and
saving on her part for many moons before she could pay off the money
which she would have to borrow in order to pay for those clothes. Still,
even a single grain of rice was better than an empty rice-bowl. "I will
do what I can."

The boy's delight at the prospect was in danger of overcoming the
reserve which he knew to be expected of him.

"I am to go to the city with you, my uncle? Oh, but that will be
wonderful! To see all the great men and learn how they make their
money..."

"Do not expect too much of the city," said Tung, with unexpected wisdom.
"It is, in many evil respects, very like the country in which you have
been brought up." But the boy had not heard him: in imagination he was
already amongst the great ones of the earth, learning how the elusive
copper _cash_ might be enticed towards the hand, like trout in a
mountain stream... Only in his imagination these copper _cash_ had
been transmuted to silver dollars, large, tinkling silver dollars.

"When do I go?" he cried, and his mother answered him.

"In no such indecent and discourteous haste as you seem to desire," she
said. "Run away now, and see that the back door into the kitchen is
locked. I fear that I forgot it in the excitement of your honourable
uncle's summons to speak with him on this matter of your future." When
the boy had gone out of the room, she leaned over and whispered: "Can
you not lend me the money for his clothes, at whatever rate of interest
you may think right and just? The moneylenders in this village of Ha Foo
devour the very bones of those who are unlucky enough to need to borrow
money from them."

"It has been a bad year," her brother replied. "Only the duty which I
feel towards my family and their requirements gives me strength enough
to keep on working, working, for a mere pittance. And you, who are not
any longer of the family of Tung, having married the late lamented Ming
Cheung Wai, should by rights depend on the family of the Mings for your
aid in such a matter as this of clothing the lad. Still... I will buy
clothes for the boy when he gets there; you and he may regard it as a
loan, to be repaid without interest as soon as the boy earns his money.
I cannot take interest from you, even if we are now of different
families. Ah, little nephew, and was the door locked?" For the boy had
come in again. "Your feet are silent on this rattan matting: I hope that
one day your step will be more clearly audible when you enter. Thick
paper soles on the polished boards, as marks a man of property." For he
was feeling kindly towards the boy and to his sister Ming Nai, as
benefactors always feel towards the objects of their benefactions.

His mother spoke for Ming So. "I trust, I also, that he may succeed. As
the Master, Confucius, says, 'First cut and then polish,' and I hope
that I have cut the jade well enough for you to polish it. Then indeed
he may attain those heights of success which your words call up to me."
She paused, wondering if this were precisely the right moment in which
to press her brother for further concessions, then decided to venture.
"But while, under your vigilant eye, he is gaining wisdom in the city, I
am wondering who will assist me in the yearly duties of rice-planting
here in Ha Foo. At present I have been able to snatch a bare subsistence
from the reluctant soil: without Ah So I fear that even my increased
efforts will be insufficient to bring in enough money to support me. And
it would not be fitting that men should say of the widow of Ming Cheung
Wai that she could not provide enough food for her brother when he
condescended to visit her."

Tung Lai Luk was grave as he sat there.

"My sister, it is very unfortunate, but the clothes which I have
promised and the food which this unproductive nephew of mine will
consume represent the extreme limit to which I can stretch the purse of
liberality. It has been a bad year, as I said: I have suffered losses:
creditors are pressing, debtors reluctant. I am not as young as I was,
and the strain is very heavy." His catalogue of woes exhausted itself.
"No--I fear that what you ask is quite impossible."

Ming Nai nodded sagely as he ceased speaking. "That is all very true,"
she said. "It is as true of me as it is of you. But my suggestion (if I
may be so bold as to make a suggestion) would be, I fancy, of advantage
to us both."

"Go on: I am listening," said Tung Lai Luk.

"If I could have a _mui-tsai_, matters would right themselves," she
proceeded. "Now I have not the money to buy one of these girls, nor (I
believe) can you spare the money from your business in the city.
Nevertheless Pai Kwat, the school-teacher, has ten children, and in the
middle of the row-of-decreasing-size stands a daughter whose age is
eleven summers. In a village such as this Ha Foo, Pai Kwat has little or
no chance of marrying off this daughter of his." She turned to her son.
"Run away again, Ah So, and stop away." They both waited until the boy
had gone out. "Now, the family of Pai is an ancient family, and he would
wish to marry the girl into a family of equal age, such as the Mings."

"I see," her brother nodded. "You propose to marry the two now. But the
expense of a marriage such as befits the two families..."

"I do not propose to marry them now. I am aware that in unenlightened
parts of the Flowery Kingdom these marriages of children still happen,
but I should regard it as a failure of my duty if I allowed my son Ah So
to marry before he knew and appreciated the main purpose and at the same
time the main disadvantage of marriage--the production of children.
Long hours in the fields provide me with many thoughts which are all the
better for an airing, so do not be shocked, my brother, if I appear
outspoken."

"Go on," Tung returned, seeing no other course. "And what then do you
propose?"

"I propose that Pai Mei, the girl in question, should come to me until
such time as Ah So, under your skilful tutelage, becomes capable of
earning enough money to support a wife, whom he will then be able to
treat as a wife expects to be treated. You will, I hope, talk this
subject over with the learned Pai Kwat; you will convince him, and you
and I will sign a document to that effect. Thus I shall gain what is in
reality a _mui-tsai_, while Pai Kwat will be free from the cost of the
girl's food (which greatly troubles him) and will gain the promise of
marriage into the ancient family of Ming. What say you, my brother?"

"The proposal has less in it of folly than one would expect," conceded
the other. "I will think it over, and if I agree I will see this Pai
Kwat to-morrow morning. For the moment I am tired after much
journeying."

She rose to her feet. "I fear that I have neglected my duties," she
said. "I should have thought of that. May I show you the bed which I
have put up for you?..."

Their voices faded into a murmur. Ming So cautiously put his head round
the corner of the door, made sure that the coast was clear, and then ran
silently to the back door, closing it after him with considerable care.



CHAPTER III IDYLL


AT the back of the mud-walled house attached to the village school was a
sleeping-room built on at a later date, designed to accommodate the
overflow of the family which the generosity of the gods had given Pai
Kwat, holder of the Hanlin degree and largely unpaid teacher to the
horde of other children which the same liberal gods had rained upon the
wedded couples of Ha Foo. The back wall of this additional room
possessed a cracked and leaky oiled-paper window, and through the corner
of this window, a long, thin twig of bamboo might be pushed with the
accuracy of long practice, so that it would tickle the face of Pai Mei,
sleeping there alongside four others of her family, tickle her face and
awaken her without waking the others.

Only Ming So had the ability and practice to manoeuvre the bamboo twig
in this manner. Besides, he alone judged it to be worth while to run the
risk of a beating from the schoolmaster Pai Kwat for the sake of a
midnight meeting with Pai Kwat's daughter.

She came out now, after he had endured a little breathless wait in the
shade of the bamboo-clump, and they moved out of sight (had any but the
great, warm moon been looking), out of sight down the path to their
secret meeting-place in the malodorous centre of what was at once the
village rubbish-depository and the local breeding-ground for mosquitoes.

He was thirteen: she was eleven. They stood shyly looking at each
other--they were always shy for the first minute--and then Ming So said:
"Let us sit down here, on this log of wood, for I have much to tell you
which concerns us both. I am going to the city with my uncle."

"That will be lovely," he heard the little voice beside him whisper.
Then came a suppressed snuffling. "I am very glad," she sniffed.

"But you are weeping, Ah Mei!" The boy was astonished. "Why should you
weep? But listen: there is other news beside that. You are to go to the
house of my honourable mother, to help her in the fields, until I am old
enough to return from the city and marry you. Is not that wonderful? The
thing which we had hoped has fallen on us like a shooting star."

"But we shall not see each other any more--not for many moons, at the
very least," she wailed. "Ooh! And I had found a new place where we may
go into the forest and bathe in the brook, and I have caught a new
_cicada_ for you, a beautiful _cicada_, the biggest I have ever seen,
and it was going to be a present for you, and--ooh!"

The Chinese do not, as a rule, kiss. It is bad manners, to say the least
of it, thus to touch another human being unnecessarily. Yet in the
luminous night these two children sat side by side with their arms round
each other, comforting, comforted. In the great black shadows under the
high trees the metallic note of a _cicada_ rang out shrilly, and in the
wet mud by their feet a bull-frog belled.

"Little Star, my sweetheart, do not mourn," said Ming So. "It will not
be for long, and think how wonderful it will be when I come back to
marry you."

"You will find some other girl, and I shall pull her hair out, so that
she shall be ugly and you will then come back to me," said Pai Mei, with
determination and despair at once in her voice. "But how do you know, Ah
So, that you will go away to the city?"

"My uncle from Kwei Sek came to see us, as I told you that he would
come, and he and my honourable mother have been burning the oil while
they sat and talked about me. I listened at the door, of course. They
had sent me out, you see, because they wished to speak privately, though
why they should wish to hide from me what is to happen to me, I cannot
imagine. Now my mother will be looking for me, and I shall be beaten,
and she will say that I am an evil child and a child of the evil spirits
of the hillside. But it does not matter, Little Star." For she was
crying again. "Take comfort. Come: we will forget my mother and your
mother, and we will go to the new place in the forest which you say that
you have found, and when we come back, what will be, will be. Come,
Little Star, show me the place of which you spoke."

She stifled her sobs now, as she took him past the high, hump-backed
bridge with the stream roaring underneath to fall into the back abyss
below the big tree, past the little shop of the leather-worker, whose
window still showed industrious light, and down the narrow grass path
beside the bottom paddy-field. Then she turned to the right between the
bushes growing at the very corner of the field, where the forest began.

And now, in the faintest of light, under the great creepers brushing
their faces, she led him through the forest. Neither considered any risk
which they might be running, though some large animal moved stealthily
in the night and the path was difficult and tortuous. Ever, ahead of
them, sounded the roar of a waterfall, and it was below this waterfall
that they eventually emerged, very close to each other, into a gloom
which seemed like daylight after the blackness of the forest. Before
them shone the water of a pool which narrowed towards the end remote
from the fall, narrowed and became shallower, on a gravel bottom. The
ripples from the fall rushed endlessly over the gravel and lost
themselves in the rank rushes of the bank.

"There!" whispered Pai Mei, with almost the pride of a landscape
gardener. "Is it not lovely?"

"It is a beautiful pool," agreed the boy. "And the gravel here would be
pleasant and clean for the feet. But I have just remembered that, if I
bathe now in these clothes, they will not be dry by the time I reach
home, and in the absence of rain my mother will know what I have been
doing. Also, when she consults with your own honourable mother
to-morrow, she will find that you, too, returned home at a late hour in
wet clothes and..."

"I can dry mine at the stove," said Pai Mei. "Besides..."

"What? And have you such a number of clothes, O affluent one, that you
can afford to take out a clean suit to sleep in while the other dries?"

She put her arm round him.

"Let us bathe without," she whispered.

      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *

The moon had risen so far in the sky that at last her slanting finger
touched the verge of the pool, then the pool itself. And in the pool,
still very close to each other, stood Ming So and Pai Mei, little
statues of grey-olive in the silver light. The water rippled round their
ankles, and they cast a little ring of splashes with each movement, as
water dripped from them.

"I wonder what my mother meant this evening when she spoke of treating a
wife as a wife should expected to be treated?" Ah So was saying. "Little
sweetheart, do I treat you as you would expect?"

"Yes," she whispered, and her arm tightened round him. Then, suddenly,
"Ooh! We're in the light!" She let him go and dashed to the shore.
Shortly afterwards, two completely naked children, each holding a parcel
of clothes to be put on when their skins were dry, trotted homewards
through the black tunnel of the forest.

On the forest's edge they dressed shyly, turning their backs on each
other, then crept towards the village. At the bridge they parted, not
lengthily, for each sensed danger from an angered parent.

And, indeed, at almost the same time shortly afterwards, two irate
mothers were engaged in chastising their children, so that two shrill
cryings disturbed the night.

Ming So yelled because he wanted to make his mother think that she had
hurt him enough. Besides, it would wake up Uncle Tung Lai Luk, and then
his mother would stop beating him.

But Pai Mei cried much more bitterly than her mother's blows warranted,
because Ming So was soon to go away to the city.



CHAPTER IV THE SORCERER


ON the ceiling swung slowly the pattern of light which escaped through
the triangular holes in the brass cover of the little hanging lamp. This
pattern of yellow prints circled about the hook from which the lamp
depended by its length of brass chain: the brass oil-container threw a
deep cone of shadow below the lamp. In the four corners of the room tiny
pin-pricks of red smouldered steadily in the darkness, and four
invisible coils of scented smoke rose upwards from the glowing _heung_
which had been lit there. The whole room was filled with the
overpowering sweetness of this incense, so that to the man sitting
motionless in the cone of blackness it seemed as if the slowly circling
pattern of light above him were receding upwards, outwards, to the
infinite heavens, leaving him seated at the hub of the world, while
about him the stars turned for ever in their slow paths.

Before him lay, open, the _I-Ching_--the Book of Changes--at the
seventeenth hexagram, and, although he could not see the book, he was
now repeating aloud, like an incantation, the meaning of the sixth line
in the hexagram:

"The sixth line, undivided, tells us to look at the whole course that is
trodden, to examine the presage which that gives. If it be complete and
without failure, there will be great good fortune."

His voice ceased as the lamp chain reached the limit of its torsion, and
the stars halted and began to retrace their unhurried paths in the
drugged heavens.

"To consider the future of which it tells," repeated Pai Kwat: "to
consider the future..."

He lifted the cover of a chased brass incense-burners standing beside
him, and threw on the glowing sandalwood a pinch of powder. To the
sweetness of _heung_ was now added a bitterness as of the rough taste of
an unripe orange.

"To consider the future..." murmured Pai Kwat: "to consider the future..."

In the darkness into which he stared hung the face of his daughter, Pai
Mei, and beside her face another dimly showed--Ming So's face, turned
towards the girl.

"The plain ground for the colours," quoted Pai Kwat sonorously from one
of the passages of the Master, Confucius, which he did not quite
understand. "Yes--I have considered the future. It shall be so."

He rose to his feet a little unsteadily and went out of the room towards
his bed, while behind him in the empty room the pale yellow stars of
light still circled endlessly, retraced endlessly their tireless orbits,
and four red glow-worms in the corners of the room showed faintly in an
atmosphere mingled of sweet and bitter.



CHAPTER V A BARGAIN


THE arrival of Pai Kwat at the house of the Mings was a matter for no
little ceremony; little Ming So, during school-time, had never treated
his teacher with the deference which now, on all hands, that august
personage found prepared against his visit. But, then, the boy was able
to reflect, Chinese customs clothe the aged with a dignity which the
profession of school-teacher is liable to destroy, and here Pai Kwat was
no longer striving to instil into effervescent childhood the meaning of
the more recondite passages of the Chinese classics. No--not at all.
Pai Kwat was here as the father of Pai Mei, and in this capacity he had
come to discuss with Uncle Tung Lai Luk the proposal for his daughter's
future. Dignity was therefore fitting. But it was amusing to see them
together--the old and the new. Pai Kwat would quote some doubtless
relevant passage from a book which Tung had forgotten (or never read),
and Tung would reply gravely with the wisdom of the merchant, always
countering theory with practice and wisdom with money. They were talking
now.

_"A wise man adapts himself to circumstances, as water fits the jar,"_
said the old man. "I have little money, and the security of my small
daughter necessitates a certain amount of forethought on my part.
_Diseases may be cured, but not destiny._"

"What you have said is wise, and indeed where should we expect to find
wisdom, if not in our teachers?" agreed Tung Lai Luk. "It clearly
behoves us parents and guardians, therefore, to see that Nature's bounty
is not wasted, and in what way, I ask you, could that better be managed
than by a formal contract between your honorable daughter and my
sister's unworthy son?" He spoke thus deprecatingly of his nephew in
consonance with immemorial belittlement. "In a few years he will,
doubtless, have gained in wisdom and ability, so that, by the time that
the family peach is ripe, he will make her a husband no more useless
than most husbands are."

The teacher nodded. "True," said he. "And yet it is an unusual thing for
me to give my daughter to your sister as a help in the house. I have
misgivings when I consider a course so uncharted in the ancient habit of
our race, so unjustified by precedent."

"But think of the advantages!" urged the merchant, as if he were selling
something. "You have no longer to support your daughter, to provide her
food, her raiment. You will know that she is in a good family, where she
will learn manners and the finer points of housekeeping. Thus your mind
will be at rest, and her shrill voice will not any longer disturb your
nightly studies. Her mother will be freed from the responsibility of
looking after her. And, when the years have made my unworthy nephew a
man of importance and your daughter a useful woman, the two houses will
be united by bonds which are firmer than mere words. We both stand to
gain not a little by my suggestion."

Ming Nai smiled where she sat, a little behind and apart from the two
men. That her brother should thus claim credit for her own idea mattered
naught, if he could persuade old Pai Kwat of the desirability of the
proposed arrangement. Ming So, beside her, listened with ill-concealed
delight to each point made by his uncle and with hardly veiled
intolerance when Pai Kwat, with warning forefinger, put forth his absurd
objections.

_"A gem must be ground by the polisher of gems, as man must be perfected
by adversity,"_ said Pai Kwat. "I do not think that your promising
nephew has yet had his share of trouble. _It is only in winter that men
know the pine and the cypress to be evergreens._ They say that _the full
stomach cannot understand hunger,_ and you cannot deny that he has been
housed, fed, and tended better than the average boy has a right to
expect. But what efforts has he made to repay his mother's devotion? Is
his work at my school such as to lead me to expect the constant
application, the unceasing labour, necessary to make him into a worthy
citizen? _A parent's affection is best shown by teaching the child
industry and self-denial._ But has the boy worked? Has he denied
himself?" He raised his shoulders heavenwards, and Ming So, unobserved,
made the motion of spitting. Having thus relieved himself, he listened
again.

"But, sir," argued his uncle Tung, "_ivory is not obtained from a rat's
teeth._ The boy is a good boy--he has aided his widowed mother for
many a year. We cannot all shine at the purely intellectual pursuits of
whose perfection you are so bright an example. Can you imagine a world
filled with nothing but literary men? No, there are other virtues
besides the virtue of attainment in letters. If we were all students of
the ancient classics, who would plough the rice-fields?"

"That again is true," agreed Pai Kwat. "And yet I would have had the lad
strive harder with his writing-brush. _Who swallows quickly chews but
little_, they say, and despite my frequent reproofs the boy persists in
a merely superficial, parrot-like learning of such poor matters as I can
find to teach him." The speaker nodded as if to compliment himself for
his sagacity. "When he is compelled to support the wife whom now we
propose to contract to him, he will have to make efforts far greater
than those which he has hitherto made."

"May I suggest," Tung countered, "that they also say that _in a wife,
virtue is needed, in a handmaid, beauty._ And we cast no aspersions on
your family when we suggest that your daughter Mei is not outstandingly
noted for one or the other. Yet we offer her marriage, in a year or two,
with the eldest son, the only son, of an honourable family. Can you
really hope to obtain for her a better offer elsewhere?"

"I would not have you imagine, for a moment," protested Pai Kwat, "that
I underestimate in any way the honour which you propose to do to my
humble family. No. But to a father the responsibility for a daughter is
nearly as great as the responsibility for a son, and while I perhaps
strive _to add legs to the snake_ in thus discussing the proposition
further, I know that you will attribute my prolixity to the love which I
bear my daughter, not to any failure to measure fairly the honour of
your suggestion."

"Then it is settled?" The merchant strove to clinch the bargain.

"Settled? I thought we had only just begun to discuss it," said Pai
Kwat, with raised eyebrows. "Now, as to money..."

"_You cannot strip two skins from one cow,_" said Tung Lai Luk, very
hastily.

"True. But _to swim with one foot on the ground_ is a mark of prudence
in the learner. And money, that evil necessity, cannot with impunity be
ignored. You propose to contract my daughter to your nephew. How much
would you...?"

"My family is poor," said Tung. "We have difficulty in filling our own
rice bowls, let alone those of others. Besides, is not the advantage of
taking one mouth from your table a matter of money?"

"She does not eat much," suggested Pai Kwat hopefully. "To split a
melon-seed in thus calculating is a feat beyond my powers. No: some more
definite payment--some tangible consideration..."

Ming So could contain himself no longer.

"But I love Pai Mei," he cried. "What is all this talk of money?"

His mother seized him by the ear. "Little chatterbox!" she cried. "You
will go in here, in the kitchen, and stay there, silent, while wiser
people discuss things which really matter. Love, indeed! And how can
love fill the rich-bowl? Can love buy clothing? In here, silent, then."
She shut the door on the boy, and, returning, lowered her head in
seeming respect as she again took her seat somewhat apart from the two
men.

"You see with what feather-brained notions his head is full!" said Pai
Kwat. "I feel more strongly than ever that I should be doing definite
wrong if I contracted my daughter to your nephew without some bond more
lasting than the love of which the boy prattles."

"He _who does not soar high will suffer the less by a fall,_" said Tung
Lai Luk. "So you propose?..."

      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *

Later on, when Pai Kwat had gone, Ming Nai said to her brother: "The old
fool desired the contract as heartily as we desired it. Why need he make
such an ado about the money?" She knew the answer to this question
before Tung Lai Luk spoke.

"Great wealth comes by destiny, moderate wealth by industry. Pai Kwat is
a very industrious man," he replied. "And, now that all is signed, we
shall make arrangements for my return to the city, with your son, the
day after to-morrow. I must interview the coolies about the baggage." He
went out.

"Pai Mei will be here for one day before I go?" said the boy to his
mother. "That will be lovely. And may we go out together for a little
while? There is much to say when a man and a woman part."

His mother smiled tolerantly.

"As you will, my son. You will soon have to decide things for yourself
without my help, so you may start now. But, first, there is the wood
which you promised to fetch for the fire."

Ming So sighed.



CHAPTER VI THE TEMPLE OF MEMORY


"YES, all is prepared for the journey," said Ming So. "My clothes are
all packed in the shiny black boxes, and there is nothing more to be
done."

Pai Mei regarded him tearfully, for even at eleven years she knew that
there was something of finality about this parting.

"For many years I shall not see you," she said, and her eyes were wet.
"Here, in Ha Foo, I shall be serving your mother and doing, probably
more thoroughly than you ever did, the things which she demands of me. I
shall help her in the duties of the house: I shall help her in the
paddy-field. And while I am here, where nothing ever happens, you will
be very far away in the great city on the river to the east, occupied
with countless matters of business, meeting countless people, and
thinking not at all of me."

"Sweetheart," the boy assured her, "I shall always think of you. When,
at night, I look out above the busy housetops to see the _moth's
eyebrow_ moon resting on a silver cloud, I shall think that you will be
looking, perhaps, at the same moon. Over the dark trees you will see the
moon and think of me. I shall go to bed each night thinking of you, and,
though we shall have between us more journeying than a strong horse
could encompass in days, yet in our dreams we shall be together. There
are always dreams."

"They say," whispered the girl as she trotted up the path beside him,
"that my honourable father knows how to reconcile the opposing
principles of the _ying_ and the _yang_, that he can foretell the future
and see the hidden metal which lives deep in the hearts of the
mountains. They say that he has control over the spirits of the upper
air, and that each night, when he retires to his room with his books, he
travels far on the sure back of a moonbeam. I do not know much of such
things, but I shall try to learn his arts, whereby a man may ride on a
moonbeam from place to place."

"Why should you do this?" Ming So demanded. "Only two or maybe three
days past I was learning in school that chapter of the works of the
Master, Confucius, which tells us that _study of the supernatural is
harmful._ How can your honourable father teach us these words of the
Master and then, each night, ride on the back of a moonbeam? A coat
cannot be both black and white, nor ground both wet and dry at once."

"Yes--a coat may be made of two kinds of cloth," she replied, "and
ground may be damp in one place, wet in another, and dry in a third. But
it does not matter: I _know_ that my honourable father can do these
things, and I shall strive to learn from him how they may be done."

"Why?" insisted the boy. "Why do what the Master says is dangerous?"

"And have you known so little of women that you do not understand? I
shall learn in order that I, too, may pass in the night over the silver
and black fields of the sleeping earth towards the city where you also
will be slumbering. I shall come to you when you do not expect it." She
looked up at him with a sudden fear. "You do not _really_ mind, do you?
I will only do it if you wish it, for I am to be your wife, and I would
not wish to disobey my husband."

"I? I mind your travels on a moonbeam? Oh, no; for I do not believe all
these tales of strange magic. Such things do not truly happen. Men talk,
and then women talk, and a tale is born. You may do as you will, little
one. But remember that, if my mother makes you work too hard, you can
always run away and come to me in the city. I shall soon be a great man,
so that there will be much space in my house. And my mother keeps her
money hidden in the bottom drawer of the medicine-cupboard, in a package
on which is written 'Powdered Snakeskin.' You have only to take what you
need for the journey, and, when you come, I will send back to my mother
the money which you have taken."

"But I have seen my father riding on a moonbeam," persisted Pai Mei.

"It was a cloud of an unusual shape, which the gods sent to deceive
you," replied Ming So. "Now, do you understand what you are to do if my
mother treats you ill?"

The girl nodded. The path up which they were climbing wound between the
great eucalyptus-trees and rank undergrowth towards the summit of the
hill. Below, to one turning back, the village of Ha Foo might be seen
nestling amongst the green like a dusty red flower. In front of them a
single tall pagoda pointed immovably at the sky, and even now, at this
distance, the two children could hear faintly the tinkle of the
wind-bells suspended from the eaves of this pagoda.

"We shall soon reach there," Ming So told her. "Then we shall kneel
before the golden image of the enlightened Buddha, asking for a blessing
on our promise to each other."

"Can the Buddha really help?" she asked. Then she said nothing more for
a while. Deep in the forest on either hand could be heard rustlings,
movings, in the gloom beneath the great trees, and Pai Mei was just a
little frightened. When Ah So had gone away with his uncle to the city,
she would have to walk up this path alone, to kneel alone before the
golden Buddha and watch the strange face above her, wreathed in the
smoke of incense.

"It was not a cloud," she said suddenly. "Because I saw him move to a
more comfortable position, and you could not do that on a cloud. It was
a moonbeam."

But now further discussion was forgotten, for they had emerged into the
public courtyard. A yellow-robed priest with shaven head glanced
incuriously at the two children as they crossed the courtyard and
entered the shine.

The long, low room was empty save for these two and the great golden
presence of the image. Up the pink wood pillars writhed carven dragons
whose heads were lost in the canopy of drifting smoke. Before the image
were set small bowls of rice, and a tray of smouldering powder in a long
train, arranged like one of the intricate Chinese characters on the seal
of Pai Kwat, the schoolmaster... The two knelt. From behind them a
breath of wind blew, cooling the back of the neck. Somewhere in the
interior of the building a voice sounded faintly, reciting a chapter
from the Diamond Sutra.

_"To be and yet not to be,"_ intoned the hidden voice.

_"To be and yet not to be, Together, at the same time, Endlessly. To be
and yet not to be..."_

Pai Mei sobbed quietly as she knelt there. Ming So was reflecting that,
in the city, there would be many other things to do besides kneeling
before images of Buddha. And, after all, these religious ceremonies were
meant for women rather than for men...

They each dropped a copper _cash_ into the great bronze bowl at the
entrance of the shrine.

"I shall come here often," said the girl. "It is very lonely on the path
climbing through the forest, but I shall come."

"They say that a man may make, in the city, enough money in a single
week to live in Ha Foo for a whole year," said Ming So. "I shall soon be
very rich."

"You will not forget me?" she whispered. "In the city there are many
strange women, much more beautiful women than I, and it is very easy for
a man to forget what he has promised."

"I shall not forget. Of course I shall not forget," he cried scornfully.
"I have promised. And, besides, these strange women of whom you have
been speaking are doubtless a great expense, and I desire to make and
save money rapidly. No, assuredly you may rest content about that. Women
are all very well in their place, but when a man sets out to become
rich..."

But Pai Mei was not listening at all. In imagination she was climbing on
a moonbeam which would shortly deliver her, breathless from the speed of
its motion, in a room in the city where Ming So would be sitting talking
to a strange woman. And then...



CHAPTER VII BORROWED PHILOSOPHY OF A POET


"DURING my own youth," said the voice of Uncle Tung Lai Luk from the
closed carrying-chair, "I could walk for many miles without becoming
tired. To rise in the morning with the punctual birds, to work while
light lasts, and then to sleep the sound, dreamless sleep of a healthy
boy--that was the ancient way. Now our youth has apparently become so
effeminate that a walk like this, beside my chair, brings fatigue before
twenty _li_ have been covered. What would you, Ming? That I should
descend from my chair into the rain and give my place to you? Are there
not bearers for your meagre luggage? Have you not the burden only of
your own body?" The voice died away in grumblings. It seemed a less
jolly uncle who now spoke to the boy from the comparative comfort behind
those green blinds of oiled cloth.

"I did not complain, Uncle Tung," said the boy. "I said that I was
tired--I did not complain. And as for your descending from the chair, quite
apart from the question of the rain, I think that would be foolish,
since it is improbable that you could walk so fast or so far as these
coolies who bear your chair on their shoulders, or even as I, who plod
along beside you in the mud."

From within the closed chair came the sound of a match being struck,
then a wisp of smoke from a cigarette.

"Let us hear no more, then, of this tiredness of yours," said his uncle.
"It is foolish to repine over things that are past, and our journey, or
this part of it, is almost over. Through the holes in the front blind I
can already see the red roofs of Ch'ang Sui, and at Ch'ang Sui a boat
awaits us. Then your shoe-leather will have less work to do. Three days
lying on your back in a boat, with nothing whatever to occupy you. Is
that more to your taste?"

"I do not know," answered the boy, "until I have experienced the leisure
of which you speak. Never in my life have I lain on my back for three
days, and I cannot foretell what my feelings will be. Is the country
through which we shall pass on this boat as interesting as the country
at Ha Foo? Are there hills, valleys, and rice-fields, waterfalls and
bridges?" He was remembering his expeditions with Pai Mei, who was now
presumably labouring with his mother in the fields.

"All country is interesting, if a man has not seen it before and is
prepared to make the effort needful in order to be interested," said
Tung Lai Luk. "But I think that the rain has stopped. The coolies may
roll up the blinds again."

      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *

The river at Ch'ang Sui offers to the uninitiated little promise of
navigation. The stream runs purling over rapids on one side of the
river, while on the other a deeper stretch of water laps against the
primitive bamboo wharfs as if it merely needed a flood to sweep away
those flimsy structures down towards the distant sea. But when the
Spring rains have passed and the river has sunk again into comparative
tranquillity, passage boats come and go, and the little village of
Ch'ang Sui wakes from sleep, to become the centre of transport for the
whole province.

"The river is very swift," said Ming So, regarding it. "And although I
can understand how one may go down the river, how is it possible to
return?"

"It requires many men and much rope to pull a boat up the swifter
portions of the river," agreed his uncle, as he stepped aboard. "But
ours is the easier journey. It merely needs a watchful steersman. Nature
does the rest, like the good servant she is. Come: bestow your goods
here, under this rattan awning. The crew sleep under that other awning
in the bows. You may be thankful, my nephew, that you are not travelling
on a public boat, where space is limited and the most ordinary privacies
are neglected. I have hired this boat because I cannot endure to have
strangers treading on my feet and interfering with my comforts. That is
the reward of toil, my nephew: to have enough money to ensure privacy,
at all events. See--the boat-master is casting off the straw ropes
which hold us to the wharf. The journey is about to begin."

He sat down, cross-legged, on the mat. The bow of the boat swung out
into the stream, then round, and when a last push had been given from
the bank, the view of the red roofs and flimsy wharfs of the little
village of Ch'ang Sui fell astern. The steersman, feet braced on the
deck, manoeuvred his great steering-oar: the chatter of the wharf died
away, to be succeeded by the continuous rustle of waters past the hull
and the occasional roar of shallow water over rocks. A bend in the river
obscured Ch'ang Sui. On each side stretched green forest, hills, mighty
trees, and ever the boat seemed to shoot down through the smoother,
deeper water, avoiding the rock as by a miracle.

"I still marvel," said Ming So, "at the exceeding swiftness of the
stream. Surely men cannot haul a boat up-river against the force of the
current?"

"They can do so. Obviously they do not build a new boat every time they
desire to go down! But if I had not come up-river myself, I should have
been reluctant to believe in the possibility of it." Tung Lai Luk
laughed. "You remind me of that poem of Li Tai Po. I trust that you have
at least heard of Li Tai Po?"

"His name I know--of his fame I am regrettably ignorant, my uncle.
What was this poem? Pai Kwat used to read poems to us at school, but I
never remember having heard one written by this Li Tai Po."

"His poem--and he was a very famous poet--was written to the women
of Pa, a village on the rapid head-waters of just such a river as this.
It runs something thus: 'To the women of Pa. At Pa the river runs
exceedingly swiftly, so that a boat travels a thousand _li_ in a few
days. How fortunate it is, O, women of Pa, that your husbands return to
you upstream!'"

"That is a fine-sounding poem," agreed the boy. "But I do not wholly
appreciate the meaning which it must possess. Why was Li Tai Po glad
that the husbands of the women of Pa had to return upstream?"

His uncle laughed again. "Li Tai Po was a man, like the rest of us, I
suppose. He wrote the poem at Pa. There, no doubt, he found charming
women--poets always find charming women. And presumably the husbands
of these women were absent, on business, down the river. They would have
to return, therefore, upstream, and the journey upstream was long and
slow. So the poet Li Tai Po, writing his poems at Pa, would have the
longer time in which to console those wives for the absence of their
husbands--a very pleasant pastime, as all who have tried it with a
pretty woman will tell you."

"But, uncle, I still do not wholly understand. For if these women were
married, surely Li Tai Po would have nothing to do with them? And a good
woman would have nothing to do with a man who was not her husband, even
if he was a very famous poet. So you see..."

"Oh, foolish boy! Truly the Master said, _'The careful people of the
villages are the thieves of virtue.'_ For you, coming from Ha Foo, think
that people do always what they should, not what they desire. Thus you
may steal virtue for yourself, at the expense of those men, more men
than you, who let the maxims of sages be conveniently forgotten, who put
discretion behind them, when a bright eye calls, who willingly barter a
little of your village approval for a night with a village girl whose
husband is absent."

The boy brooded for a while, watching the bright sequence of the passing
landscape. Then he said: "No doubt such are the habits of poets. But
neither you nor I write poetry. Therefore no such excuse lies available
for us."

"You have much to learn, my nephew. Now lie on your back on the matting
and go to sleep, or at any rate cease your chatter, for I am tired." He
arranged himself in comfort and closed his eyes. "Man is the servant not
so much of his virtues as of his eyesight, where a pretty girl is
concerned," he observed finally.



CHAPTER VIII BOTTOM, THOU ART TRANSLATED


MING SO suddenly woke up in the night and lay perfectly still in his
blanket. For a moment he imagined himself back at his mother's house in
Ha Foo, and half listened for the familiar rustle of the night wind in
the clump of bamboos beside the gate. But his ears now caught a very
different rustle--the sound of silk rubbing on silk. Then a voice
spoke on the deck near him--a woman's voice.

"There are many mouths to be fed in the village, and little wherewith to
feed them. Therefore, hearing of your arrival at the village of Seung
So, I told my friend here of the previous business which I did with you
a year past, suggesting that you might be willing to take into your own
rich household one of these mouths. Her father has two sons and seven
daughters."

"Let her father speak for himself," said the voice of Tung Lai Luk. "For
always it is best, in affairs of this sort, to deal directly between
principals. Not that I shall forget that you have performed the
introduction. Let him speak for himself."

"I am Yang Foo, a man of this village of Seung So," said a third voice,
on the invitation, and the voice was the voice of an old man. "I have
two sons and seven daughters, as has been said. Last year, as you must
know, our crops were almost destroyed by blight, and all the weaving
which has been from the immemorial past the duty of our women in the
winter was finished a moon ago. Yet even that has brought a poor price
in the market, and I have left but little money wherewith I may buy rice
for myself and my family."

"Fortune is unkind," agreed Tung Lai Luk. _"But it is only in winter
that we know the pine and the cypress to be evergreens."

"Then," the old man proceeded, "I have but one course open to me. Girls
are of use in the winter weaving, but if there is no more of that
weaving to be done, the head of a family becomes painfully aware that
they have mouths, eating, eating, unproductively. Now a rich man like
yourself can employ usefully in his house more women than I, who am only
a poor man. A very poor man. If, in return for my daughter here, I might
receive sufficient money to keep myself and my family until the harvest..."

"It is a pity that you did not come in daylight," said Tung Lai Luk.
"But, since we arrived at dusk and leave at dawn, I suppose such a thing
would have been impossible. Very well, man has made lanterns where the
miserly gods refuse daylight. So let us look at this girl of yours." An
arrow of light shot under the awning where Ming So lay, as a lantern was
moved. "Why, but she is an ill-favoured little thing!" Tung complained.
"Even had your harvest been better, I doubt greatly whether you would
have succeeded in finding the girl a husband. Though a man be concerned
almost wholly with the cultivation of the fields, he would, I imagine,
prefer to have a comely companion when those labours are over and he
returns to the home roof-tree. But this daughter of yours..."

"My daughter is as her mother bore her," said the quavering voice. "I
have heard, too, from my friends, that they consider her not
unbeautiful. Nay, it is not seemly thus to belittle her in order to
bring down the price. Come--there is no need to adopt commercial
methods with me. I am her father, and a daughter is not a thing to be
haggled and bargained over. Make me your offer, and, if it be
reasonable, good. If not, good also. The gods have taken away our
food--let the gods provide other food. The responsibility is theirs."

The woman's voice broke in. "Before you name prices," she said, "let us
decide what proportion of this price I shall receive. For I have gone to
much trouble and loss of time in order thus to arrange a meeting between
you. What proportion?"

"Of every five _cash_, you shall have one and her father four," said
Tung Lai Luk. "Now, is that to your liking?"

"It will serve, though it is not generous," the woman returned.

"Good. Now, I will make an offer. As I have said, she is not of the
marrying sort, and it will be difficult to find her a husband when she
gets too old to be useful to me. Still, we may find occupations for her
which do not too much depend on beauty. Say a hundred and fifty
dollars."

"You would not get a girl like that, a strong, fine girl, for less than
five hundred dollars," retorted her father. "And you offer me a hundred
and fifty! Come--there is no use in discoursing further. I have been
insulted. It is the price of but the foot of a girl, not of her whole
body. Come: we will go."

There was the sound of people rising to their feet. Then the voice of
the boy's uncle said soothingly: "Nay--be not over-hasty. Maybe I have
overlooked some virtue in the girl. Sit down again." The voices fell to
a murmur.

Ming So was still tired, after his walk of the morning, and when he next
woke there was silence on the boat, except for the ripple of the still
moving water where it eddied past the piles of the bamboo pier and
rustled along the planking of the stationary boat. Then his ears
detected another sound, too--the sound of dry, voiceless sobbing from
the deck beside him.

The boy lay for a while listening to these sounds. In the sky, as he saw
it through the open end of the rattan awning, a faint promise of dawn
showed. In another hour the journey would begin again. Why sacrifice
that hour's sleep because some unhappy person saw fit to weep in that
particularly irritatingly silent way just beside him?

"Be quiet, or I will hit you!" whispered Ming So, and then withdrew his
own head under the protection of the blanket.

      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *

Dawn had drawn aside her curtains of grey-silver and the great golden
ball of day topped the hills in the distance ahead of them, down-river.
Ashore, the village was already astir. Coolies staggered with their
loads: a woman appeared for a moment at the door of a hut, charcoal
sticks in her hand. In the bows of the boat a man turned over on his
back, sighed in a long-drawn "Ai-ah!" and sat up.

Ming So also sat up, to survey the world. Uncle Tung Lai Luk snored
slightly at the rear of the shelter, where the draught was least. Rolled
in his blankets, with only the profile of his sleeping face to be seen,
he did not rouse in the boy any sentiments at all. Ming looked at his
uncle exactly as he would have looked at a pile of clothing. But,
sleeping in the entrance to the shelter, at the opposite side to the
boy, lay the arrival of last night, in a cotton wrap somewhat too small
to cover her completely. She had rolled the sides under her, so that she
resembled a cylinder, from the end of which her feet protruded. Ming So
studied these feet. They were, of course, unbound--for hat would be
the use in a labouring household of a girl crippled by foot-binding?
Strong, healthy feet they were, the toes parallel to each other,
flattened somewhat by constant walking barefoot. The toenails were
short, bent over slightly towards the sole of the foot, and dirty.

She must be about fifteen, Ming decided: much older than Pai Mei, his
sweetheart. Her flat little face looked unseeingly at the roof, for she
was still asleep. Beside her, in a small bundle tied with a cloth strip,
lay what he imagined were all her worldly goods. The girl's mouth was
slightly open, and between the rather thick lips the boy could see part
of a strong white set of teeth.

The crew were moving now. A rope was cast off. Someone shouted, and the
steersman clambered round on the gunwale of the boat, leaning on their
rattan shelter, as he made his way to the stern. At the sound of his
passage the girl worked as Ming watched her.

He had never seen a girl wake up before. Of course, there was that time
when Mei had gone to sleep at the edge of the paddy-field, in the long
grass, and he had awakened her with a splash of cold water. But, then,
that did not really count. Mei's awakening had been too sudden to
compare with this.

The strange girl opened her eyes a little way, so little that he was not
sure if she had opened them at all, then shut them again. A sort of
wriggle passed down the grey cylinder in which she lay, and she made an
effort to draw her feet into the warmth within. But so tightly was the
cloth rolled about her that when she drew up her knees the encircling
cloth cylinder followed. She opened her eyes again, wider this time. A
puzzled expression crossed her face, and she looked round her with
apparent interest. Then she sat up and unrolled herself in one movement,
sitting in her cotton covering with her feet drawn under her, fully
dressed.

_"T'so shan!"_ said Ming So, in the universal greeting whereby men of
every race assure each other that the morning, at all events, is good,
whatever may be expected of the rest of the day. "Have you eaten your
rice?" For this latter question is also a politeness--however obvious
the truthful answer may be. But somehow the very word "rice" reminded
the girl of those economic reasons which had led to her being seated on
the deck of a strange boat, now racing downstream, instead of facing an
inadequate stock of food and an irate mother in her own house. She
remembered the transaction of last night, and the separation from her
parents and family which it implied. At any rate, Ming So concluded that
this was so, since she began to cry again, softly, silently.

He rapidly put on the outer clothing which one discards on going to bed,
folded his blankets in a neat pile, and went forward where the cook was
engaged in coaxing a small charcoal brazier into a flame. As he went
forward the boy made a slight detour and spat expressively into the
river below. Why should women always be crying? He spat again, then went
on towards the cooking.

      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *

Breakfast in China is not an early meal, to be sniffed at before the
appetite has properly grown to breakfast-point. It was, perhaps,
half-past nine when Ming returned to the awning in the stern of the
boat. He found it easy to sit, as he had been doing, in the bows and
watch the wheeling landscape approach, pass, and fall astern of them, to
gaze over the side at the undulating water and see in its turbid depths
the occasional gleam of a polished rock over or past which the boat shot
miraculously. And only the familiar smell of cooked food, which reached
him on a sudden, erratic breath of wind, recalled him to appetite and
its gratification.

The other two passengers were now sitting opposite to each other on the
deck under the awning, eating. He noticed for the first time that his
uncle's jaws and throat moved convulsively, and that as they did so they
emitted a milder version of the noise which is made by a cow--a
squishing, propelling noise. As he sat down and took from the girl the
bowl containing his own ration of rice, he was displeased to find that
his own eating, too, was not exactly silent. Further, the girl as well
was making these faint, unpleasant sounds, which he had now noticed for
the first time, as she ate her own rice. This amused the boy at the same
time that it annoyed him, but he took longer than usual in finishing his
first bowl, in the effort to achieve silence, only to discover that his
uncle had, by then, removed to his own bowl the best of the dainties
which lay in the steaming dish on the deck between them, for consumption
and appreciation when the first bowl of rice should have dulled the edge
of appetite.

"You sleep well?" Uncle Tung Lai Luk asked kindly.

"Oh, yes, uncle, except that early this morning I was awakened by
strange noises from this girl. I was compelled to tell her to be quiet
before I could recatch my sleep."

"We must excuse her," said his uncle. "She is a little sad just now,
because she, too, is leaving her home to experience the unknown joys of
the city. We must excuse her--she will in time suppress these childish
expressions of sorrow and learn that women should only be noticeable
when men desire to notice them."

Ming So stared at the girl and the girl stared in return at Ming So.
Now, with the warmth of the rice in her stomach, she was apparently
feeling far from depressed, for a smile flickered near he eyes, only to
vanish again when she saw that Tung Lai Luk was watching her. Then the
smile vanished, to be replaced by a look of vacancy which was her only
alternative to the hatred which she really felt. But Ming So did not
know this: he only saw her smile and then look vacant, so that he
sniffed and turned up his nose while with facile chopsticks he rescued
such dainties as his uncle had not already taken.

"The day promises to be fine," said the boy. "I hope that the rains are
really over now, for I much doubt if this awning would keep out very
much of the water. What do you think yourself, uncle?"

"I think as you appear to do," replied the other. "Yes, a boat such as
this is a sore trial when the rain pours down through the awning, and
everything is wet."

"Is there no space below this deck, uncle?"

"No. In any case, the small space below is full of merchandise. You do
not imagine that I could afford to engage a boat like this just to
transport myself--and you? Oh, no; before we arrived at Ch'ang Sui the
boat had been filled with the products of the country. The profit on
sales may possibly recoup me for some small part of the expense."

Ming So did not reply to this. He was reflecting that his uncle was not,
in the world's sense, generous. And, that being so, he was the more
puzzled to explain such of last night's half-heard conversation as he
could now recollect. If Uncle Tung was not generous, why had he
purchased this girl from her destitute parents for so very large a sum
of money? Uncle Tung must have a very large staff of servants at his
house in the city, if he could thus add one to their number at a
moment's notice...

Later, as the boy sat again in the bows watching the water in front of
the boat, he heard the girl come and sit down beside him. He continued
gazing in front of him, waiting for her to speak, as he knew all women
did if you left them to themselves, and after a little while she did
begin, in a soft, wavering voice which was new to him.

_"Jade rivers in Sz'chuen fall Down hills the hue of spring: At dawn and
sunset Huang's tears Fell too, remembering."_

Her voice ceased, and, when he looked round at her, she had dropped her
eyes again to the turbid waters of the river.

"But that is great poetry," said the boy. "Such poetry as Pai Kwat, our
honourable teacher, used to recite to us in the hours of school." There
was no reply, so he went on: "And it is suitable poetry, too, for we
move on a river flowing between banks of brilliant green, and yet, this
morning, you wept. How is it that you know by heart poetry to suit your
momentary mood?"

"I know much of the work of our great poets," answered the girl's soft
voice. "My mother, who came of a noble family, has often recited old
poetry to me, and I have not forgotten it. Do you, then, like poetry?"

"Of course I like poetry. Are there any who do not, except those the
doors of whose hearts are closed to beauty?" He was a little proud of
that sentence. "Of all the classes of men in the State, the poet is most
highly honoured. But I am surprised at your knowledge of poetry, for I
seem to remember a conversation in the night, when everyone thought that
I slept, with regard to the price of a girl who, my uncle said, was
ill-favoured. I did not, therefore, expect to find her equipped better
for revelry in a prince's court, for the wearing of the _rainbow skirt
and feather jacket_, than for the exercise of the more domestic
virtues." Everyone should recognise that quotation. It came from the
same poem--Po Chu-I's "Everlasting Wrong." And sure enough, at the
words she smiled as she looked at him.

"So you, too, know the 'Everlasting Wrong,' do you? In my house only my
mother and I ever talked of these things: my father considered it more
praiseworthy to speak of the badness of the crops, and my two brothers
also spoke only of the things concerning the farm. So my father..."

"I see," said the boy. "It is sad to find a family in which poetry is
unappreciated. For, indeed, if we do not admire the excellences of our
ancestors, how shall we perfect ourselves?" He was, quite consciously,
quoting his teacher, Pai Kwat, word for word. But she need not know
this. "What is your name?"

"The only name my parents gave me is Yang Fei."

"But," the boy cried. "Yang Kuei-fei was the name of the princess whom
the Emperor Huang mourned in the very poem which you have just been
reciting--the 'Everlasting Wrong.' That is a peculiar thing to happen
to you. I think I ought to call you Kuei-fei."

"You seem," said the girl, "both to know and to understand more than a
boy of your age might be expected to know and understand. How comes it
that you know not only the words of the poems which have been written,
but also the stories which made the poetry?"

"My teacher, the honourable Pai Kwat, is a great man. Not only was he
skilled in literature, but they said, also, that he held communion with
the spirits and could transport himself from place to place on a
moonbeam. I have learned a little from him."

"As to travelling on a moonbeam I dare not venture an opinion, for a
moonbeam is a very insecure sort of a vehicle. But as to your teacher's
ability with brush and bamboo tablet, I judge from your own words. I
judge from your words that he was a man who stood out above his lesser
fellows." Her conversation was becoming animated, now that she had
overcome her first shyness. "And are you, too, going with _him_"--she
nodded her head towards the stern--"to the city?"

"That is my present intention," the boy replied. "It appears that he is
in need of men of honesty and brains. So..."

She laughed. _"A man must despise himself before others will,"_ she
said. "But, while you are doubtless sitting in an office dealing with
large sums of money, I shall be engaged in the menial duties of his
house, under his wife's keen eye. How, then, may we talk again of these
subjects?"

"Time and opportunity may be commanded," answered the boy sententiously.
"And the study of literature, being the highest and noblest of the arts,
takes precedence over other more worldly considerations. So I shall
await the future with confidence. But will you have the kindness to
repeat again the whole of the 'Everlasting Wrong' of Po Chu-I? How does
it begin?" He began reciting with particular care.

"_The Emperor loved love: he sought
Through all his wide domain
For one whose lightest glance could wreck
An empire--but in vain._"

"Who was the woman of whom it used to be said that her glance could wreck
an empire?"

The girl busied herself picking to pieces a fragment of rope which lay
on the deck. "That was Madame Li, the concubine of the Emperor Han
Wu-ti. She said, one day, 'One of my glances would subvert a city, two
an empire.' So the Emperor sent her away from his side. It is not wise
to boast." She continued, in her soft voice:

_"Yang Kuei-fei, secluded, Her childhood's days had spent: A woman now,
she nothing knows Of Love's embarrassment..."_

When she had finished, the boy said: "You say poetry beautifully, much
better than Pai Kwat, my teacher. Oh, but look, Kuei-fei, what fish your
bait has caught."

For the crew of four, excepting the steersman, had congregated behind
them. In China, poetry is recognised as the highest of the
accomplishments, and it is only necessary to begin to recite the
"Everlasting Wrong" or the "Ballad of Mulan" to gather a crowd at any
street corner.

"Go away!" cried Ming So. "The entertainment is over."

"Can she say the 'Ballad of Mulan?'" demanded the nearest man.

"Certainly she can, O seeker-after-something-for-nothing, but she will
not. Is this a place of public entertainment? Go, I tell you!" His uncle
had chartered the boat, and therefore his nephew, Ming So, was a person
of some small importance for the moment. The crowd of four dispersed.
"They are unpleasant, common men," said Ming So.

"I do not think that a man who loves poetry can with justice be called
common," she returned. "But so many men listening makes me shy. I would
not have continued if I had known that they were listening to me."

"We must certainly speak more of poetry, Yang Kuei-fei."

"That is not my name. But what is yours?"

"I am Ming So, the son of Ming Cheung Wai, who _travelled to the West_
before I remember. My mother lives alone in Ha Foo with the girl Pai
Mei, to whom, when I am older and have made much money, I shall offer
the shelter of my roof."

"It is time enough to think of marriage when the hair has grown," the
girl replied. "Now you speak of a thing of which you are ignorant. I am
old enough, I, to get married. You are still an unfledged boy."

"That is as it may be," he said. "But I know that my uncle has signed a
marriage-deed for me, so what you have said is just dog's wind."

The girl tossed her head and got up. "Very well--it is dog's wind, if
you say that it is dog's wind. But I shall spend several happy moments,
now, thinking of what you do not know about marriage!" She left him
wondering what she meant.



CHAPTER IX OARS IN THE TWILIGHT


ONE night remained. Towards noon on the next day it was hoped that boat,
cargo, and passengers would safely reach the city of Kwei Sek at the
mouth of the river. Already the crew could be heard debating in
increasingly strident tones the various opportunities for enjoyment or
duty which stood outside the door of the coming day. Ming So was full of
excitement. Only the girl Yang Fei sat silent on the mat in the stern of
the boat, taking no part in these rejoicings.

Then, as they crept towards the night's rest at another, the last little
village, a strange craft put off from a creek some two _li_ above their
evening destination. The sun had sunk half an hour ago, and twilight
made the pale shadows of reeds into lances, the cry of an owl into the
shriek of a lost soul. The strange boat, propelled on the now broader
surface of the river by eight oars, had twice the speed of the
cargo-boat, so that it was but a few minutes before she was alongside.
The crews ceased rowing, and three men, attended by a fourth carrying a
lantern, stepped on board. Their leader, his size exaggerated by the
gleams of the lamp in the fast-departing twilight, came towards the
stern with another man.

"Who is master here?" he demanded of Uncle Tung Lai Luk. "Is this your
boat?"

"I am but a humble passenger of this boat, which belongs to a rich man
who is to join us, I was told, at the village which we had hoped to
reach to-night, but for this doubtless unavoidable delay," Tung replied
modestly. "To what fortunate circumstance do we owe the pleasure of your
visit?" And saying this, he must have completely frustrated his
intention of appearing a man of small account, for the accent in which
he spoke and a faint suspicion of irritation in his voice seemingly told
the stranger precisely those things which Uncle Tung Lai Luk had not
desired the stranger to know.

"Truth is not a characteristic of merchants," said the newcomer with a
laugh. "This is clearly your boat. And, were it not for the
inconvenience of being compelled to dispose of the cargo, we should take
away your boat also. As it is, we shall take only you. Your family will
be told, by those whom we leave here, that ten thousand dollars--a
mere flea-bite to a man who is the possessor of so cultured a voice--will
procure your freedom, and that it will be wise if your family
brings here this money at sunset, after one moon has passed from to-day,
since, if they omit this simple precaution, certain grosser and perhaps
more decorative portions of your anatomy will be sacrificed to the God
of Wealth before we let you go. I trust that you are married? For a wife
is so sweetly appreciative of the personal appearance and abilities of
her husband."

"This is an outrage!" began the merchant, but the other cut him short
with a curt word of command. Tung Lai Luk was dragged to his feet. To
Ming So his uncle's face seemed the colour of antique paper as he stood
here, but only the light of the lantern lit this uncle's face, and Ming
was too surprised to feel either fear or anger. His brain dully told him
that these must be the river pirates of whose existence rumours had
occasionally reached Ha Foo from travellers, but his attention was
engaged also by the fact that in his lap, as he sat there on the deck,
fell something small and hard--a cylinder some three inches long. As
his uncle followed without further useless protest over the side of the
boat, Ming realised that the object which he held in his hand was his
uncle's _chop_--the seal which stamps the owner's name at the bottom
of a document, and which is as recognisable to those who deal with him
as is a European signature. Tung Lai Luk had contrived to supply his
nephew not only with proof of his identity, so that he might if
necessary arrange for the ransom, but also with authority to act for his
uncle, who must therefore trust him somewhat more than he trusted some
at least of his present captors...

The sound of the raiders' oars died away; the boat, without any further
orders, again took up her course for the night's anchorage, and a high
patter of comment came from the crew. Yang Fei had said nothing, so the
boy spoke to her.

"I was not aware that the waterways of our Republic were so inadequately
guarded and policed as seems to be the case," he said. "It is terrible
that a prominent citizen like my uncle should not be able to travel in
safety, and that he should be called upon, quite illegally, to make a
huge payment for his freedom."

Yang Fei laughed. "I do not care," she said. "To one so poor as myself
or any other member of my family these robbers are harmless, since we
have nothing to lose. But your uncle, and men like him, have taken our
money, and so it is fitting that some of our money should be taken from
him. I wish that it could be given back to us."

"But that is wrong," protested the boy. "If, as you say, my uncle and
men like him have gained money at the expense of your family, that was
by fair trade. This is mere robbery, and I am surprised to hear your
attempt to excuse it."

"Morality is for the rich," she said, and was silent.

The boy reflected on his future course of action. He felt very much
alone now, without the guiding hand and worldly advice of his mother,
however cynical she might be, and without the rather tarnished ideals of
hi uncle. What had they meant, those men, to do with him? "Certain
grosser and more decorative portions" of uncle Tung Lai Luk--tales of
cropped ears and fingers came back to the boy. That could not possibly
be allowed to happen. He would have to get his aunt, the honourable Tung
Nan Tsz, to collect the sum of money as soon as he reached the city of
Kwei Sek. There would be no time to waste. After all, though his uncle
had given him the _chop_, a boy of thirteen could hardly hope to take
the initiative in collecting so huge a sum for a ransom. Then this girl,
Yang Fei. He bitterly resented her attitude, with the bitterness of the
lonely and helpless. Contrary to all the basic principles of justice as
expounded by the wise men who had compiled the classics of China, to the
views of his teacher, Pai Kwat... Little Pai Mei would never have said
a thing like that. She was too sensible. Or was she? Women are always an
incalculable quantity, he reflected.

This conclusion was confirmed when, tied up at the anchorage for the
last night's halt, the boat swung gently on the water and Ming returned
to the bamboo shelter where the evening meal awaited him in the dim
light of the swinging lantern. For the girl Yang Fei now waited on him
with an attention which was capable of only one explanation--an
explanation which was at once flattering and perturbing. And Ming, as he
went to sleep that evening lying in his blanket at her side in the
shelter, mused further on women and what they meant to him. He found the
subject disquieting, the more so since Yang Fei, at her side of the
shelter, was clearly not asleep, for every now and then he could hear a
little smothered laugh, as if she had thought of something very funny
indeed. But youth takes no long heed of disquiet when there is no light
anywhere, and soon he was dreaming happily of his sweetheart Pai Mei
standing at his side, knee-deep in the pool below the waterfall in the
forest at Ha Foo, and in his dream the slanting moonlight fell clear of
the high trees and touched her olive skin to the semblance of a velvet
intimacy...



CHAPTER X "THE HAPPY HEART"


JUST after noon of the next day the boat was tied up to the great stone
wharf in the city of Kwei Sek. The usual crowd of ricksha coolies and
labourers rapidly assembled, sensing work to be had for the asking. But
Ming So, very much on his dignity, instructed the master of the boat to
remain at the wharf until further orders.

"You will keep this ill-mannered mob from trespassing on the boat which
my unfortunate uncle has hired," he said. "As soon as I have consulted
with the family, further orders will be sent to you. Until that time, do
nothing. That should not be a difficult task for you." And with this
parting shaft he stepped ashore, carrying in the black, shiny box all
his belongings. He bore the box himself, for he dared not risk a refusal
to obey orders on the part of any of the crew, and, in any case, the box
was light. He hailed two rickshas.

"You will ride after me," he told Yang Fei, and sat down.

"Where to?" enquired the runner, and for a moment Ming So's heart fell.
Then he took the risk.

"Where to? O unobservant! Why to the house of Tung Lai Luk, and be quick
about it."

The rickshas moved off, and the boy concluded with a sigh of relief that
apparently his uncle was well enough known locally to make the mention
of his address unnecessary. Still, he wished that he had possessed the
forethought to enquire before landing. Uncle Tung Lai Luk's remaining
luggage--he had only taken a single suitcase with him into his
unfortunate and enforced exile--was in the second ricksha with Yang
Fei. The boy leaned back in his seat and contemplated the city as if he,
like his uncle, owned some considerable part of it. But his dignity was
troubled by certain guffaws which the two ricksha coolies exchanged,
crying to each other as they pad-padded along the road: "Tung Lai Luk!
Hai-ya! The little ones go to Tung Lai Luk's house. Ha-ha!" And Ming So
could not quite understand the reason for this amusement.

      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *

The two rickshas drew up before a four-storey house in one of the
narrower streets, and the boy, with just enough delay to make sure that
the cause of the halt was their arrival at their destination, and no
other, stepped out. It would never have done to step out of the ricksha
if the runners had stopped for a traffic regulation, or from shortness
of breath. It would look foolish to do so, after trading on their
knowledge of the whereabouts of his uncle's house...

The house was large in comparison with the others in the street, but he
noticed that its brass scroll-work entrance was copied, farther down the
street, by several other apparently similar establishments. He began to
be consumed by a curiosity as to the precise nature of his uncle's
trade.

In answer to his call, a small serving-maid appeared at the door. Behind
her a porter lounged in a wicker chair.

"I wish to see the honourable wife of Tung Lai Luk," said Ming So, and
the child smiled.

"Many have wished that," she returned, "but seldom without advancing a
reason."

"I am Tung's nephew," he told her. "Now, lead on."

She shrugged her shoulders, but led on. There were three flights of
stairs and one corridor to traverse before a door opened and he entered
the room beyond with Yang Fei.

"This boy says that he is your nephew," the small maid said. "Shall I
show him out again, and tell the porter to add to his speed?"

"But why...? Where is the honourable Tung?"

The woman sitting at the far side of the room rose and came towards him.
Ming was surprised to see a much younger woman than he had expected. Of
middle height, as a Chinese girl should be, she had the high cheek-bones
of the Northern Manchu, while her movements, sudden and graceful,
betokened Southern blood as well. How had his far-from-young uncle
managed to marry this radiant being? The boy noted the touch of
rice-powder which accentuated the redness of her lips, the perfect
blackness of her "moth's eyebrows," the lazy yet fiery glow of her dark
eyes. She raised her arm with a flash of embroideries in the light from
the windows in the roof. "Where is he?" she demanded, her forefinger
threatening him.

Ming So recoiled a step before her. Then he took from an inner pocket
the _chop_ which his uncle had dropped in his lap as the pirates had led
him away. He removed the small cap, pushed up the red ink-pad inside the
tube with his finger, and then, pressing the _chop_ itself on to the
pad, withdrew it and made, on the palm of his small hand, the impression
which the _chop_ bore. "Tung," she read, as the boy held up his palm for
her to see. "That is the _chop_ of the honourable Tung, my husband.
Where is he, and how did you come to have possession of that _chop_?"

"May I sit down?" Ming So asked. "I thank you. Events over which neither
I nor my unhappy uncle had any control have led, I greatly fear, to a
long and possibly expensive separation of husband and wife. Last night,
just before we reached our evening anchorage..."

When he had finished, he laid the _chop_ on the table. "It is for you to
say what should be done," he told her. "For my part, I do not like the
threat of the man to remove certain ornamental portions of my uncle. I
think that the man meant this threat seriously, and I advise payment, to
avoid the greater evil which would otherwise befall him."

"Ten thousand dollars!" the woman shrieked. "And how, O fool, do you
imagine that I can find ten thousand dollars, and how do you think that
we are going to continue to live here if we pay ten thousand dollars? It
is all your fault. You should have warned the crew when you saw the
other boat approaching, so that flight might have saved you from them."

"They had eight oars: we had three," Ming So replied simply. "You may be
sure that, if it had been possible, we should have escaped. But it was
not possible."

And now, as women will in such circumstances, Tung's wife wept, and Ming
So watched her weep. When the sound had subsided somewhat, he spoke
softly.

"If you are willing, my aunt, I will go and interview my uncle's
friends, so that they may advance the money which you find it impossible
to collect. For indeed it would be undutiful of us to let him suffer a
fate so disfiguring and so unpleasant to both of you. Then, further,
there is the case of this girl, whose name appears to be Yang Fei. Or so
she told me. My uncle purchased her from her impoverished family on the
way down the river. Would it not be possible to tell her again, if you
could find a buyer, and to devote the proceeds to my uncle's ransom?"

"That!" shrieked Tung's wife suddenly, out of her sobs. "That! Why, she
is worth but the smallest fraction of the immense sum which, you tell
me, we must raise. She will earn her price in a week. What did you say
that the honourable Tung Lai Luk paid for her?"

"I do not know. My uncle began by offering a hundred and fifty dollars,
but then I went to sleep and I do not know at what figure the sale was
concluded."

"You slept! Of course you slept! More than a hundred and fifty dollars?
Waste! Now go from my presence. I must think, and when I have thought I
will send for you to tell you my decision." She issued rapid
instructions to the small serving-maid. "Go now. Leave me."

Yang Fei came last, as usual.

      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *

Ming So found himself in a small room on the top floor. The room was so
small, in fact, that he was reminded of the rattan shelter on the boat.
Strangely enough, Yang Fei had apparently been allotted a similar room,
next door, which was a strange thing to contemplate where a servant was
concerned, the boy reflected. Still, if even their servants had separate
rooms, the Tung establishment must be rich enough to produce the ten
thousand dollars for the ransom without much difficulty... He disposed
his property around him and changed his coat. Then, while he was
hesitating what to do next, there came a rap at the door with the
finger-nails, and Yang Fei entered.

"Ah Ming!" she cried, and her agitation was such that he hardly realised
that her manner of address was regrettably familiar. "I have just
discovered what nature of house this is! I was standing at my door when
another girl came, followed by an old woman in black and a young man.
They all three went into the room next to mine, and after a while the
old woman came out again, carrying money, which she counted. She
fluttered the bank-notes between her fingers and then went away. I
listened, then, at the door of the room where the girl and the young man
had gone in and..." Her eyes filled with tears. "Alas, I do not know
what will become of me!"

"Shut the door first," said the boy. "This affects you, not me, but I do
not see why you should allow a draught to enter as well as yourself.
Indeed, this is a strange story which you tell me. So that is the nature
of my uncle's business, is it? Well, there are worse, and the business
will not be subject to trade depression, I imagine. But it certainly is
surprising. And you are crying now. Why?"

"I do not want to stay here," wailed the girl. "I want to go back to my
village, now, and starve."

"But starvation is painful," he aid. "No--that would be foolish. In
any case, you are hardly likely to find that much work is expected of
you so soon after your arrival here. Though I must confess that I
thought, when my uncle purchased you, that you were to be just a
serving-maid, like the child who let us in."

"Listen!" she whispered. From the next room but one came laughter, then
a girl's voice singing. "She is happy!" Suddenly the voice stopped. "Ah!
He no longer desires her to play to him. Ah Ming, this thing is bad."

The boy had got up.

"I am going to see the things which happen in this house. I shall go
downstairs and find out. You may remain here, if you wish to dry your
tears in my room rather than in your own and have you reflected that
you are lucky to have a room of your own? It is not usual, in the case
of purchased girls, of _mui-tsai_..." He went out.

The stairways were wide and hung with curtains, but Ming met nobody
until he reached the street level. Here was the entrance-hall again, and
he noticed what he had not seen before--that the brasswork could be
slid across, if required, like a barrier, by the porter who sat, or
rather lay, in the bamboo chair at the side of it. This porter winked at
Ming So.

"Well, little one, and what are you doing here? You are surely too young
to justify me in asking you which girl of our collection you are
desirous of enjoying?"

"I am the nephew of the honourable Tung Lai Luk," said Ming So, and the
porter laughed. "Therefore I have come to see what happens in this
remarkable house. Tell me, where does a man eat his rice, for I am
hungry?"

The porter laughed again.

"I have heard many times that tale of a nephew," he said. "It is a very
old tale, old as the mountains of Shansi. No, it appears that, in spite
of your age, you may be here for the same purpose as many another who
values the moment above the morning after. Which girl do you want? There
are many here, all different and all alike."

"I desire no girl. I desire to eat rice," protested the boy. "My uncle
would not be pleased if he knew that I was hungry and that his porter
lay on his back in a chair, unwilling to help. My room is on the top
floor, and its number is eighty-seven. Unless rice is brought rapidly,
there will be unpleasantness." He turned on his heel. Then, as an
afterthought, he added: "I shall require at least two bowls of rice."

As he ascended the stairs again he encountered a young man whose breath
smelled of wine.

"Yes, run upstairs if you like, little one," this man cried after him.
"You will not always be able to run so fast." And, indeed, the man who
had thus addressed Ming appeared to find some difficulty in getting
downstairs himself, for he was holding on to the rail which ran down the
opposite side of the stairs from the wall. Ming took no notice and went
on. At the top of the house he paused, for there were voices in his own
bedroom. Then he went on again and entered, to find Yang Fei standing
and talking to another girl, whose extremely bright pyjamas caught the
boy's eye at once.

"This is Tung's nephew," said Yang Fei.

"And I," said the other girl, "am called Lien Fa--The Lily. I hear
that your uncle has been captured by pirates, and that his wife hopes to
be able to pay ten thousand dollars for his release. I should have
thought her well quit of him. If I had men like that coming to see me, I
should give up business. He is fat and slow and stupid."

"It would not be right to let him suffer the forcible removal of ears,"
replied Ming So. "I cannot agree that it would be right. After all..."

"You will talk less of right when you have been here a little while
longer," said The Lily. "In Tung's establishment--which calls itself,
as you will have doubtless seen, 'The Happy Heart'--there is no room
for justice. All the bedrooms are full already. There are very few rooms
that are not bedrooms."

A knock sounded on the door, and the little serving-maid appeared.

"If this woman Yang will follow me, I will show her where she may obtain
rice and rice-bowls for you both," said the child. "Do you want yours,
Lien Fa? The girl Yang might bring it."

"Yes; take her," replied The Lily. When the door had closed again she
continued in an amused voice: "That is the only advantage of 'The Happy
Heart'--the meals are at no fixed hours. They cannot be, owning to the
nature of the business. One may eat rice whenever hunger comes--and
hunger comes at strange times to us girls. You are lucky--you can have
yours brought to you. But I did not know that Tung had a nephew. His
family must have been less fat and useless than he is. Tell me about
yourself." She sat down on the boy's bed. "Do you not wonder at the
possession of a bed like this, a big bed, instead of being compelled to
sleep on the floor? Yes, that is another advantage of 'The Happy Heart.'
Now, tell me--where did you live before you came here?"

Ming So began to lose a little of his shyness as he sat there on his own
bed with this strange girl beside him. He told her about his home in Ha
Foo, and had got as far as a disquisition on the virtues of little Pai
Mei when the girl Yang Fei returned with three bowls of rice and one of
savoury meat and vegetables, in a lacquer carrier. With her arrival,
Ming's flow of words deserted him.

"I will tell you more of these matters another day," he said. "For the
moment I am hungry, and I suggest that we should eat."

Lien Fa laughed and held out her hand for the bowl of rice.



CHAPTER XI THE BEARER OF A NOBLE NAME


EXCEPT that his sleep had been somewhat disturbed by sounds of laughter,
music, and similar noises from adjacent rooms, Ming So had passed a
comfortable night. In the light of the dawn he looked round him at the
little room, taking stock. But no sooner had he begun to reflect on "The
Happy Heart" and its occupants than instantly he remembered the
predicament of his uncle, and the necessity for action on the part of
that deplorable woman, his aunt. She had promised to send for him
yesterday to discuss what might be done about the ransom, and here was
the next morning.

He sprang to his feet and put on his outer clothing. Outside the door,
in the passage, the small servant-girl was sweeping up an assortment of
empty cigarette packets and the husks of melon-seeds.

"Where is your mistress?" the boy demanded. "I must speak with her at
once. It is most important that I should speak with her."

"The noble lady," said the child, using a very respectful title, "does
not rise until towards the middle of the hour of the Horse, when the sun
stands highest in the heavens."

"But she will rise earlier this morning--I know she will," the boy
persisted.

"She has not risen, for I came from her room a moment past, and she was
still sleeping. To rouse her would lead to much unpleasantness, for she
possesses no light hand."

In the face of this, Ming started off back to his bedroom. Life was
going to be extraordinarily dull, with nowhere but his bedroom to go
to...Yang Fei came round the corner of the passage.

"Come," she said. "Lien Fa is awake, and wants to see you. I think that
you amuse her."

"I have nothing better to do," replied Ming So, "and therefore I shall
come with you. But otherwise she should have asked me in vain. Amuse
her, indeed! It is she who amuses me."

Lien Fa was still in bed, her great black eyes regarding him over the
bed-coverings with evident pleasure.

"Here is our little talking-bird," she cried. "Come in, and tell me a
tale of your village of Ha Foo. No! You must not sit there--move the
music-box, Yang Fei. How should I entertain my visitors if you sat on my
music-box?" And, when the younger girl had moved the gramophone to the
floor, Lien Fa sat up in bed. "Come, sit here and talk to me. I like to
hear you speak--it reminds me of the time when I had two little
brothers of my own, like you."

"Are they dead, then?" asked Ming So, prepared to condole with her.

"No--I have left my family, so that I can no longer call them my
brothers. Besides, they have married and gone to other cities. They are
very respectable citizens. Open the window a little, Yang Fei--there
were many evil-smelling cigarettes smoked here last night, and I have a
small headache. Now, little one, talk."

"I cannot talk freely when so important a matter as my uncle's ransom
goes unattended to," replied the boy. "I am sad to think that his wife
is so undutiful as to sleep, to be sleeping now, when she ought to be up
and out, collecting money for my uncle's ransom."

"Is it really as innocent as it appears?" demanded Lien Fa of the
ceiling. "Is it possible that such an unsoiled mind really exists? Tell
me, little one, what did you dream of?"

"I dreamed of Pai Mei, whom I am to marry," he answered. "Again I was
walking with her up the path to the temple where we parted--again I
was leading her, that night my uncle came to Ha Foo, along the forest
path to the pool where, under the waterfall, we bathed in the
moonlight."

"Tell me," said Lien Fa suddenly, "is this Pai Mei of yours beautiful?"

"I think her so," he replied. "To me she represents woman, and I measure
others by her. How far short they fall!"

The girl lazily got out of bed. Yang Fei sat on the floor, watching her
open-mouthed as she poured water into the hand-basin and then took off
the jacket of her pyjamas, for Yang Fei was not accustomed to washing
when you were obviously not dirty.

"I am called The Lily," said Lien Fa, smiling back at Ming So over her
olive shoulder as she washed. Here was none of the undeveloped child--the
muscles rippled gently up and down her arm as she rubbed a wet cloth
over her neck. "I am called The Lily, and you measure me by your Pai
Mei! Foolish boy! Your Pai Mei will never be as beautiful as I. Look.
Will she?"

Somewhat embarrassed, the boy looked at her as she stood there in her
brilliant pyjama trousers with the wet cloth in her hand. So that was
how girls developed when they grew up, he thought.

"Pai Mei is different," he said loyally. "I do not think that she will
ever look as you look now, but I do not really wish her to resemble you.
She is different."

"Little fool!" said The Lily, and returned to her washing, mildly
amused. "You know so much of women, you do. Of Yang Fei here, for
instance. A pretty pair you would make. Yang, turn the handle of the
music-box as I showed you yesterday."

Yang Fei put on a record, inserted a needle, and wound up the
gramophone. Lien Fa completed her washing to the accomplishment of a
Chinese song which told of girls gathering reeds in the river when a
prince passed by.

"I wish a few princes would come here," said she petulantly. "I have
also some foreign records. Would you like to hear them?"

"I think if you do not mind, that I will return to my own room. I have
just remembered that I have to write a letter to my honourable mother,
and another letter as well."

"To little Pai Mei, to tell her that you have seen me washing?" laughed
The Lily.

"I do not think that I shall mention your washing," said Ming So
seriously. "It would not interest her." And he went out to write his
letters.

Lien Fa remained pensive for a moment. Then, with a sudden access of
energy, she flung the wet cloth at the retreating boy and kicked off her
trousers. "Little fool!" she cried again, and Yang Fei put on the other
side of the record.

      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *

At noon he was fetched to go to the wife of Tung Lai Luk. In her top-lit
room she sat, where he had seen her last, beside a huge blackwood screen
decorated with gold dragons.

"I have been thinking about you and what we shall do with you," she
began. "Have you any idea what my unfortunate husband intended?"

"I fancy," said the boy, "that he intended to let me help him in the
business which I understood he did here in Kwei Sek. But, now that I
have seen the nature of this business, I am not so sure, for what could
I do to help him a house such as this, full of girls? I cannot keep
girls in order for him."

"No, that is true. Sit down, child. I think that what your uncle wished
was for you to live here and keep him better informed than he used to be
as to what goes on--the intrigues which there are bound to be in a
house full of girls."

Ming So seated himself on the edge of a porcelain stool. "While I am, of
course, anxious to do whatever my uncle intended, that might of
necessity be altered by the changed circumstances. He has been taken by
brigands who threaten to remove portions of him, and I should like to
know what you are going to do in the matter of his ransom. That seems to
me a more pressing matter, and I should like to know..."

"If you would think less and talk less, you might be of more use to
everybody," she interrupted him. "Do you think that I am not doing
everything which I can do? Do you think that I am leaving it to chance?
Last night, after seeing you in the afternoon, I began at once to
approach people who may be able to help. You can set your foolish little
mind at rest about the steps which we shall take for your uncle's
release. Now, until I give you further orders, you will move about
amongst the girls and report to me ever day at noon all the gossip which
you hear. You should not find this difficult, since you have, I presume,
struck up an acquaintance with the ugly little girl whom my unfortunate
husband so unwisely bought. What friends has she made?"

"She was playing the music-box of the girl called Lien Fa, The Lily,"
answered the boy. "That is all I know"

"Good. Then from her you will hear all that matters, for Lien Fa has a
tongue which never ceases wagging save when she sleeps, and that is not
often. Now go."

Ming So decided that he did not particularly like this woman, his aunt.
He saw also that she was clever, for she had turned the conversation
from the ransom to gossip amongst the girls. How if she did not really
want her husband back? Lien Fa had as much as hinted at this.

"Who saw the noble lady yesterday afternoon?" he demanded suddenly of
the little serving-girl.

"Yesterday afternoon? There was a seller of silk, and three women, and
then a man from the Government--he stopped a long while. That was all,
I think. Why do you desire to learn this?"

"And do you desire to learn why I desire to learn? Women were ever
curious!" He went into this bedroom and shut the door behind him. Time
looked like hanging heavily on his hands. He would go out and post the
two letters which he had written. But as he felt through his pockets,
where he was sure he had put the letters, his hand encountered another
piece of paper. He drew it out and read:

"If you would ask your mother's advice, call instead on the very
honourable descendant of the Master, one Kung Hiao Ling, who lives at
the corner of Market Street and Frog's Lane, in the city of Kwei Sek.
His advice would be mine, for he has all the wisdom of his ancestor,
Confucius, and I knew him when I was young. Remind him, if he will
condescend to see you, of the girl who gave him his hat when he dropped
it at the Eastern Gate."

He recognised his mother's writing. But how? He did not remember hearing
his mother say anything about this paper... She must have put it in
the pocket when she packed his clothes. He almost ran down the stairs.

"Going out?" said the porter lazily.

"Or coming in backwards," answered the boy. "I go to the post office.
Tell me its whereabouts."

"You follow this street until you come to the wine-shop. There you turn
to the left: that is Market Street. As far along that road as a man may
see in a light mist lies the post office."

"Your courtesy is more marked than I had hoped," returned the boy.

Without much difficulty he found the post office and despatched his
letters. Then he searched for Frog's Lane, and finally located the house
where Kung lived--the very wine-shop which the porter had mentioned.
The boy ascended two flights of stairs, guided by information from the
folk on each floor, and finally found himself in a single great room,
running the full depth of the building, on the highest floor. A man sat
cross-legged on a mat in the very centre of the room. A few screens
indicated that more domestic details might be found behind them, by
those who cared to look.

"Have I the incredible honour of addressing Kung Hiao Ling?" he asked,
abashed in the presence of a man who watched him from below heavy lids
as he sat there immobile on his mat. "I fear that I interrupt your
studies?"

The man inclined his head.

"I am the unworthy bearer of a noble name, and you do not interrupt my
studies," he said. "Go on..."

"Once, at the Eastern Gate, a girl picked up and gave back to you the
hat which you had dropped there," said Ming So.

"That happened to me--long ago. What of it?"

"The girl was my mother."

Kung rose to his feet and bowed. "Welcome," he said. "So polite a mother
had a son? It is almost incredible. But..." He held out his hand for
the paper--scanned it. "Your mother rates me too highly. But tell me
your trouble, and I will give you advice, if I have any to give."

"I am the son of Ming Nai," began the boy, in the time-honoured formula
which begins all stories.

"Sit down with me and continue," interposed Kung Hiao Ling. "Now, go
on."

      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *

"You have, of course, written to your mother to inform her of these
facts?" Kung asked.

"I have written. But, as I wrote the letter before the interview with
the wife of my uncle, I was not able to tell my mother how, in my
opinion, insufficient effort was being made to collect the ransom. But
then there was the officer of the Government who called on my aunt
yesterday afternoon and stayed for a long time. It is possible that he
came on my aunt's invitation, and that she seeks, by means of military
force, to free my uncle without a cash payment. Is that possible?"

"It is possible," agreed the other, "thought it is hardly likely. For
the officials of this new Government look askance on establishments such
as that of your uncle. In fact these establishments have, in some
provinces, been closed by order of the local Government. Here we are too
reactionary at present, perhaps, for so drastic an action on their part,
but it will come. What I intended to convey to you was that even here
the officials look on the business of your uncle with disapproval, and
would therefore be unlikely to make efforts to release him."

"But," the boy cried, "I feel that it is my duty to set him free. After
all, it was on my account that he undertook the journey, and therefore
it was because of me that he was captured."

"You unduly flatter your importance, I think," Kung Hiao Ling smiled. "I
do not think that a man like Tung Lai Luk, whom I have met and (I am
afraid) disliked, would journey so far up the river just to see to the
future of a small nephew. No: the girl whom he purchased, and the fact
that the boat was full of merchandise, both show that the affair of
bringing you down to the city of Kwei Sek was only incidental to his
other interests. Besides, he hoped, if what your aunt says is true, to
make use of you as a collector of gossip. But one can never trust women,
as you will discover."

"That is very true," agreed the boy.

"Well, let the matter stop there for the moment. I will enquire from
certain friends of mine whether she has approached the Government about
releasing your uncle. I will also, through other friends, find out
whether she has attempted to borrow the money for his ransom. You will
doubtless be able to find cause to go again to the post office
to-morrow, when you have written to your mother your account of to-day's
events. Come, then, to see me at the same time, and I may be fortunate
enough to have news for you. But do not talk, nor tell to your excellent
aunt too much of what you hear from the girls. A still tongue is worth
uncounted gold."

"I will do as you say," the boy promised.

"And, on your way downstairs, tell the master of the wine-shop that my
wine-jar is empty. Walk well."

"Walk well," echoed Ming So, in parting politeness.

      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *

In an upper room of the establishment known as "The Happy Heart" two
were talking in the dark. Their voices, at any rate, were very close to
each other.

"She is unaccountably reluctant to arrange for your freedom," said the
man's voice. "I cannot understand her reluctance. Have I not given her,
or at any rate offered, everything that a woman in her position could
desire? Have I not even given her what I would have preferred to have
given only to you?"

"You have," the girl agreed. "She is a water-rat, and the daughter of a
water-rat, and I hate her." She paused. "But, then, you have given her
this thing of which you speak, only once, or twice, or ten times. She
desires it not once, or twice, or twenty times, but always. Do you not
realise that, O blind lover?"

There was only a rustling now. Then the man's voice replied. "I see
that, but I do not desire her. I desire you, sweetheart, and to give to
the water-rat what I desire to give to you only, fills my heart with
loathing and my mouth with a bitter taste."

"Is it not therefore possible, O my lover, that she understands your
feeling--the feeling of which you have just spoken? May she not know
how insincere is your gift? Perhaps that may explain why she still
withholds her willingness, why she puts needless obstacles and
difficulties in our way. But"--and the girl's voice became tender--"am
I worthy, then, of all this trouble? Do you so much desire me?"

"The land desires the rain, and the rain desires the land," he answered.
"Have I then spoken that you would have had me speak? But do you think
that my father could help me? He is, as you are aware, unscrupulous and
without heart, but for me, his son..."

"Your father can do little if she does not wish it," said the girl. "She
is as a granite rock which the water wears away in a year less than a
man can measure. Her heart is of flint. It may be broken, but never
touched."

"What you say is true," replied the man. "In fact, her demands have
lately become greater. I have spoken to my father on the subject, but he
only laughed, saying that women never know what they want."

There was silence for a space now in this upper room in "The Happy
Heart," where these two debated their future. There seemed little more
that might usefully be said. But, after a while, the girl's voice
continued: "I think that she desires you, and in that case I cannot
imagine why, as all the house knows, she has at the present moment not
you, but your father, in her room. I cannot but feel that here is matter
which calls for explanation."

"Do not talk so much," the man's voice replied, laughing. "All will
solve itself, and for the moment we are very happy, are we not?"

"Yes, but..." began the girl, when her voice was lost in laughter.



CHAPTER XII TRAGI-COMEDY


THE day had passed in unendurable peace. To Ming So's enquiries they
replied that Tung's wife was busy and could talk with no one. Lien Fa
was asleep, and, when he wakened her, swore at him and went to sleep
again. Yang Fei proved unbearably dull--he began to realise that in
reciting the "Ballad of Everlasting Wrong" she had exhausted her
repertoire, or so it seemed. The porter, whom the boy approached in
desperation, was reading a novel, and resented interruption.

So the afternoon, and evening passed in utter boredom. Ming So began to
wonder how he could possibly live in "The Happy Heart" for very much
longer. He missed the unending work and incident of the country, finding
the city spiritually a Gobi desert of dullness.

It was about ten o'clock, when the life of the establishment showed
signs of beginning and Ming thought of bed as a refuge from inaction,
that Lien Fa brought a man friend into Ming's room. This man was not
more than twenty-five, and Lien Fa's attitude towards him indicated that
not only her business and professional instincts were affected here. The
boy suddenly realised that The Lily, too, had a real sweetheart. Only
the relations of the two lacked the innocence of Ming's relations with
Pai Mei.

"Here is the callow cavalier," cried Lien Fa to her man. "He knows all
about girls, he says--he, at his age. And behind that door"--she
pulled in Yang Fei by the arm--"stands another innocent. Behold the
two love-birds. And, even so, he has another girl elsewhere." She struck
an attitude, and the man laughed.

"Well, you stand in no danger, Lien Fa, from the girl's competition, so
far as beauty is concerned!" he said. "And if this callow boy can see in
her that which makes a man forget himself, he has weaker eyesight than I
have. What was the amusement of which you spoke, O Lily? Does it concern
these two?"

"It does concern them, very closely," answered Lien Fa. "Do you stand
here by the door and prevent their escape. I will do the rest. Watch!"

Ming So interrupted her. "I should be glad if you would leave my
bedroom," he said. "Honoured as I am to meet this lover of yours, I feel
that sleep is the best occupation for the evening, and it was my
intention to go to bed."

The Lily laughed a little uncontrollably, and he saw, to his disgust,
that she had been drinking. Her man stood in the doorway, mildly amused.

"You shall go to bed," cried The Lily; "you shall certainly go to bed.
But for our amusement you shall not go to bed alone. First, I will
remove from this room all clothing and bed-linen to the room of the girl
Yang Fei. Then you shall see what is to be seen."

"You are mad!" cried Ming So. "Those clothes are mine: put them down!"

"See the lion defending its fur!" said Lien Fa, collecting clothes.
"Come on, if you are so inclined. Try to stop me!" She pushed the boy
violently back into Yang Fei, snatched up the bedding, and carried it
out of the room. "Keep them there, Ah Loo," she cried as she went out.

Ming made a dash for the door, to be seized by the arm and held in a
grip from which he could not escape.

"The boy struggles like a hare in a net," said the man, Ah Loo, holding
him without effort. "Come back and do what you propose, while I have him
fast."

Ming So knew, as he struggled vainly, that the scene was photographing
itself indelibly on his memory. He saw his black case in the corner,
lying open, while all his spare clothes were carried out of the room.
Yang Fei, in another corner, with utter consternation in her moon-like
face, took no part in the proceedings. The bed had been stripped down to
the mattress: the curtains of the room were removed.

"Help!" cried Ming So, and the man put a hand over his mouth.

"Stop yelling," he said, "or I will twist your arm, so."

Then Lien Fa came back to the door, entered, and shut it after her.
"Now," she said, and her eyes were bright with wine, "now. Let us make
them blush. I like seeing children blush, when they do not know why they
are blushing. It will amuse you, Ah Loo. Hold him tightly--he is very
like an eel." But even the boy's wriggling availed little when Lien Fa
took hold of him...

Freed, the boy crouched in a corner, his outraged modesty welling up in
angry tears. He sank his head on his hands, so that he did not see Lien
Fa seize the girl Yang Fei in her turn. He only heard little sobs--"Don't!
It is not right!"--and the laughter of Ah Loo as he watched.

"I will tell the officers of the Government," sobbed the boy. "They will
punish you both."

Lien Fa laughed and set Yang Fei at liberty, "Poor little fool! I always
said that you were a fool. Ah Loo, or his father, constitutes a most
important part of the Government. And do you think that your word will
be taken against his? Do you not know that Ah Loo had a long interview
with the noble lady Tung yesterday about purchasing my freedom? Silly!"

"They make a fine pair, thus, seen crouching in corners without their
clothes," chuckled the man. "Although she is an ugly little thing, and
he is skinny. Still, it is amusing. What do we do next, Lien Fa, to
amuse ourselves?"

"I think that we go away," The Lily replied in a whisper, "and leave
them alone together. After a little while they will be less like wild
beasts crouching there in the corners of the room. Come; I will carry
the clothes of these two, and we will lock the door on the outside.
Then, by and by, we shall come back."

"He is very nearly a man, but not quite," was the last thing Ming heard
Ah Loo say as he shut the bedroom door and turned the key in the lock.

      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *

When the sounds of their feet had died away, Ming So rose to his feet
and blew out the lamp.

"So," he said. "I do not know what we can do now, for they are excited
with wine and may not return for hours to let us out. It does not matter
very much for you, Yang Fei, for you are only a girl. But for a man like
me--the indignity..." He became incoherent for a moment as the memory
flooded back to him. "I shall leave this house tomorrow. I shall leave
it as soon as I can."

Yang Fei's voice sounded for the first time. "It is not warm, Ming So,
and my skin is already becoming chilled. What shall we do?"

"There you go!" Ming groped his way to the bed and sat on the edge of
the mattress. "Troubling about the coldness of your skin! It does not
matter, I tell you. The question is, how am I to escape? That mule's
daughter Lien Fa shall suffer for this. I will tell the noble lady Tung
how she has behaved. I will tell the Government. I will tell..." He
stopped suddenly. "The window! Can we get out that way?" He ran across
and threw it open. There was not here the usual verandah running along
the side of the house, and in the dark, even, he could see the space of
bare, blank wall between him and the window of Yang Fei's room, next
door. Below, out of sight but not out of hearing, the stream ran
bubbling with the late spring rains, at the base of the building. There
was no escape. He shut the window with a bang and swore. "She is the
daughter of a pole-cat. May the gods afflict her and her unpleasing
lover with diseases such that they will be objects of disgust to each
other and everyone else. May..."

"What is the use?" demanded Yang Fei as she sat beside him on the edge
of the mattress, "of cursing them like that? You are wasting your
breath. What must be, must be, and it seems that we are fated to spend a
few hours together. We may as well not spend them in useless sorrow.
Lien Fa and her man will come and let us out some time, and until then
we can sleep."

"But, I have no clothes to sleep in, and no bedding to sleep under," the
boy complained. "They have left us not a stitch of clothing, not a
blanket nor a rug. They shall suffer for it, I tell you!"

"It is not as cold as I thought at first," Yang Fei murmured in the
darkness. It seemed as if her voice were nearer, as she had shifted
t