Read The Red Chamber Online

Authors: Pauline A. Chen

Tags: #Fiction, #Historical, #Cultural Heritage, #Sagas

The Red Chamber (5 page)

BOOK: The Red Chamber
13.83Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

The boy appears to be much struck by the youngest girl’s opinion. He stares at her face for a moment, before casting the cape onto the
kang
. “Xichun’s right. It’s too showy. Give it to someone else,” he says carelessly.

Before the old woman can remonstrate, Xifeng tugs Daiyu up to her. “Look, Granny. She’s here!”

The room falls silent as everyone turns to stare at Daiyu. She is seized by shyness, but thinking of her mother’s injunctions, she remembers her manners and falls to her knees. “Grandmother,” she says, pressing her forehead to the floor.

“Raise her up, Xifeng,” the old woman says. Xifeng tugs Daiyu, not gently, to her feet.

“So this is Min’s daughter. Let me have a look at you.” Lady Jia pulls
Daiyu closer. Daiyu expects her grandmother to ask about her mother, or perhaps embrace her. Instead, Lady Jia simply stares at her. Daiyu stares back, trying unsuccessfully to find some resemblance to her own mother. Whatever pretensions Lady Jia ever had to beauty are long gone. Her iron-gray hair is pulled into a tight knob, and her snub nose and broad jaw give her face a pugnacious look.

“You look like your father,” Lady Jia says. Her tone leaves no doubt that she does not consider this a merit.

“I can see something of Min in her,” says Uncle Zheng. He has seated himself on one of the chairs near the door and is drinking a cup of tea.

“Let me see your hand,” Granny says.

Unable to think of a reason for refusing, Daiyu puts out her right hand.

Granny clutches it in her hard, dry grip and draws it a few inches from her eyes. “Hmm, very pretty. Fingers as slender as scallions. Even prettier than yours, eh, Baochai?”

The oldest girl on the
kang
, the one who had been holding the mirror, looks up and smiles. “Yes, Granny.” Daiyu is afraid that she will be offended by the comparison, but her placid face shows no sign of displeasure. Unlike Daiyu and the other girls, Baochai’s figure is womanly, with full hips and breasts. Her honey-colored gown, though clearly costly, is drabber than the pinks and greens the other girls wear. Her complexion is beautiful: almost poreless, with the flush of a peach on her rounded cheeks. She gives the impression of distinction, but on closer scrutiny her face is not really pretty. Her mouth is rather tight and thin-lipped for her broad face, and her smallish, single-lidded eyes make her face look expressionless.

“How’s your father’s health?” Lady Jia asks.

“Good.”

“How old is he?”

“Forty-four.”

“Your mother gave birth to a son some years ago, didn’t she?”

“Yes, but he died when he was only three.” Daiyu still winces at the memory of the sweet, delicate little boy.

“Your father’s getting on. Why didn’t he get himself a concubine then, when your brother died? Now he has no heir, and the Lins are about to die out.”

Daiyu jerks her hand away. “My father would never have gotten a concubine.”

“Maybe he’ll get one now.”

Daiyu is jolted from her shyness by anger. “My father has no intention of remarrying. He loved my mother—”

Lady Jia gives a bark of laughter. “That shows how much you know about men.”

Xifeng intervenes swiftly, taking Daiyu’s hand with a smile. “Why don’t we introduce you to everyone?”

Baochai comes up to make her bow, followed by the other two girls on the
kang
. “We call these two the ‘Two Springs,’ ” Xifeng says. Even though their gowns are of different colors, the cut and design of their clothes, and the jewelry and ornaments they wear, are nearly identical. The elder, who is tall with sloping shoulders and a pretty oval face, looks to be about Daiyu’s age. The younger one, who had criticized the cape, is shorter and plumper, with an upturned nose like a kitten’s.

The older girl, who closely resembles the boy in the “peacock gold” cape, smiles at Daiyu. “I’m Tanchun, ‘Exploring Spring.’ ” She points at the other girl. “She’s Xichun, ‘Cherishing Spring.’ ”

“They were named for our great-aunt Her Highness the Imperial Concubine,” Baochai explains. “
Her
name was Yuanchun, because she was born on the first day of spring.”

And now the boy who was trying on the cloak comes up. He cannot be anyone but Baoyu. He is so handsome that all the light in the room seems to shine on him. Low over his brow he wears a gold headband shaped like two dragons playing with a large pearl. He is dressed in a jacket of slate-blue silk with tasseled borders and medallions down the front, over a pair of ivy-colored embroidered trousers. He does not kowtow, but looks at her as if he and she are the only two people in the world.

“Haven’t I met you before?” he says. She expects him to be arrogant, but the tone in which he addresses her is gentle, almost courtly.

“No, I’ve lived in the south for my whole life.” Although she has almost never spoken to a boy her own age before, she does not feel shy with him.

“That’s odd. I feel as if I’ve seen you before. What are the characters in your name?”

“The ‘yu’ is jade, like in your name, and the ‘Dai’ is the kohl that women use to darken their eyebrows.”

She senses him staring at her long, straight eyebrows, without the hint of an arch, something that the neighborhood children back in Suzhou teased her about.

He laughs. “It suits you. Do you have a nickname?”

She shakes her head.

“Then I’ve got one for you: Pinpin.” It is a diminutive form of the word for “frown.” Baoyu continues teasingly, “Your given name refers to a kohl that women put on their brows. And your own brows are puckered together in a little frown. It’s a perfect name.”

She feels her cheeks start to redden, half in embarrassment, half in annoyance.

“It’s the first time you’ve met and already you’re giving her a nickname,” Baochai murmurs. “Don’t you think you’re being a little too familiar?”

“Baoyu, where are your manners?” Uncle Zheng says, but the boy ignores him.

“Can you read?” he asks.

“Yes.”

“Do you mean girls’ reading, like
The Classic for Women
,” he speaks scornfully, “or real books?”

She draws herself up. “I’ve read the Four Books. That is, I’ve read Confucius, and Mencius, and the Great Learning, but I’m still in the middle of the Doctrine of the Mean. My father taught me himself.”

“What poets do you like?”

Daiyu hears Lady Jia click her tongue disapprovingly. “Isn’t it enough that girls receive a basic education, enough for them to be able to run the household? It’s a waste of time for them to be educated like men.”

Ignoring her grandmother, Daiyu says, “I like Li Qingzhao’s song lyrics. I used to like Li Shangyin when I was younger, but now I find him rather vulgar—”

“Li Shangyin?” Baoyu interrupts her. “But most people consider his poems very difficult. They’re filled with references to lots of obscure ancient texts. Are you sure you understand them?”

“What do you know about ancient texts, Baoyu?” Jia Zheng interrupts dryly.

“I read what interests me,” Baoyu replies. Now it was time for his cheeks to redden.

“Let’s see how far that gets you on the Civil Service Exams.” Uncle Zheng sets down his cup of tea. “I was under the impression that before I left we agreed you wouldn’t miss any school while I was gone. Yet I find you quite at your leisure.”

“I said he could stay home to meet his cousin,” Granny Jia puts in. “Besides, he wasn’t feeling well these last few days.”

“Well, Baoyu, are you fully recovered now?” Uncle Zheng’s tone is sardonic. “Would it be reasonable to expect you to go back to school tomorrow?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And if I speak to the schoolmaster in a few months and find that you haven’t made any progress, I’ll beat you. Actually, I feel I owe him an apology for sending him such a hopeless case.”

“How can you talk like that?” Lady Jia says. “Baoyu is exceptionally talented.”

“Is he? I have yet to see evidence of any extraordinary talents, except for laziness and obstinacy.”

“I don’t understand you, Zheng,” Lady Jia says. “So eager to put down your own son. It’s almost as if you were jealous.”

“Jealous! What could I possibly be jealous of?” Uncle Zheng’s incredulity strikes Daiyu’s ears as overdone. She remembers her mother’s words: Uncle Zheng had been jealous of her as well.

“I’m sure I don’t know, but I seem to recall the schoolmaster beating you for not learning your lessons when you were Baoyu’s age.”

Her uncle’s face flushes with anger.

Once again, Xifeng is swift to intervene. “Surely our cousin is tired after her long journey.” She pats Daiyu’s hand fondly. “Why don’t I take her to wash up so we can all have dinner?”

The dinner is as extravagant as Daiyu could have imagined. A procession of maids brings an endless supply of dishes, while others stand at attention holding fly whisks and napkins. Often she cannot tell what she is eating. Even ordinary ingredients are prepared in elaborate, unfamiliar ways, like the eggplant, which seems to have been cut into thread-fine strips, before being fried and smothered in a sauce with minced chicken. She is unused to such rich food, and would have liked to fill up on rice, but even the rice is of an exotic sort, lacking the comforting blandness she craves, the grains such a dark purple that they are almost black. She tastes and nibbles, hoping no one will notice how little she eats.

Two new young men are present at dinner. The older one introduces himself as her Cousin Lian before taking his seat. He is good-looking, somewhat more thickset than Baoyu, and carries himself with an easygoing air. The other one, a skinny boy about her own age, sidles in as if he
half expects to be thrown out. He does not say a word but stares fixedly at her from his seat on the other side of the long table. She hears the others call him “Huan.” She herself is seated between Tanchun and Xichun, across from Baoyu and Baochai. Uncle Zheng and Lady Jia sit at the head of the table.

Uncle Zheng is telling his mother about the flooding on the Jia estates he had visited during his trip south. “The damage was worse than I expected. They say the water reached all the way to Hankou.”

He proceeds to describe the necessary repairs, but Lady Jia hardly looks up from her dinner. Daiyu is surprised by the greedy way she attacks a drumstick of roast duck.

Xifeng, as the
xifu
, or daughter-in-law, does not eat with the others, supervising the serving of the meal from behind Lady Jia. “That piece looks tough for you, Granny.” She chooses a breast piece, cutting the meat off the bone.

Around Daiyu, Baochai and the Two Springs chatter about how they have spent the afternoon copying sutras.

“Ow,” Tanchun says. “My hand is so sore that I couldn’t write another word.”

Baochai turns to Daiyu. “Granny wanted us to do it so the family would accumulate merit,” she explains.

“I liked copying the sutras,” Xichun says, her small face serious. “I never understood them so well before. Have you read any sutras, Cousin Daiyu?”

“Only the Heart Sutra,” Daiyu says, pleased to be included in the conversation.

On the other side of the table, Jia Lian asks Baoyu, “What are you doing tonight?”

Baoyu sighs. “I suppose I have to go to the Prince of Beijing’s birthday party. I’d rather stay home and spend time with our cousin.”

“What is the Prince doing for his birthday?”

“The usual. An opera troupe, some singing girls.”

“Watch out that Uncle doesn’t get angry,” Lian warns him, shooting a glance up the table towards Jia Zheng.

Baoyu shrugs. “He can’t expect me to stay home and study every night. It would offend the Prince if I didn’t come.”

“You don’t have to convince
me
. I’m just telling you to watch yourself now that Uncle is back.”

At long last the meal is over. When the table is cleared, the maids pour
tea into cups of celadon crackle glaze. Daiyu reaches for her cup and drinks thirstily, eager to wash away the greasiness in her mouth.

A ripple of laughter fills the room. The maids cover their mouths to stifle their giggles. The boy called Huan guffaws. At the head of the table, Lady Jia takes her cup, sips the tea, and gargles with it. Deliberately she spits it into a
Ding
-ware bowl that a maid holds before her.

Daiyu has drunk the tea meant for gargling. She feels herself grow hot with embarrassment. Across the table, Baochai, her gaze tactfully averted, daintily gargles and spits out her tea.

“Hey, Frowner,” Baoyu says. He picks up his tea and downs it to the last drop.

5

On his second day back at Rongguo, Jia Zheng goes to his mother’s bedroom, where she has retired after breakfast, to tell her that he is returning to work at the Ministry, and will not come home until evening. She is half reclining on the
kang
while Silver, one of her senior maids, massages her legs. Even though they finished breakfast barely half an hour ago, Snowgoose is bringing her two little yam cakes with date stuffing on a small lotus-shaped platter. That is an aspect of his mother that never fails to irritate him: despite her sensitive stomach, she refuses to exercise the least restraint over her diet. Lady Jia opens her eyes as Snowgoose offers her the cakes.

BOOK: The Red Chamber
13.83Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

Other books

The Heart Is Not a Size by Beth Kephart
The Bottle Ghosts by Dorien Grey
Bewitched by Sandra Schwab
Shuteye for the Timebroker by Paul Di Filippo
Love's Dance by Roberg, Marianna
Once upon a Dream by Nora Roberts
Falling Into You by Jasinda Wilder
Beowulf's Children by Niven, Larry, Pournelle, Jerry, Barnes, Steven