The Valley of Amazement (61 page)

Finally, the painting reached me. My first feeling was eeriness. I recognized the place in the painting. I had lived there. Yet I knew that was impossible. The light of the room behind me disappeared, the voices of the others faded away, and I was transported into the painting, to the long green valley. I felt its atmosphere as real and present, the touch of its cool air, and I had a complete understanding that this was my home, and the solitude was not loneliness but the clarity of who I was. I was that long green valley, unchanged from the beginning of time. The five mountains were part of me as well, my strength and courage to face whatever entered the valley. The sky held dark gray clouds, which cast shadows over part of the valley, and I understood that storms had once buffeted me and I had had to cling to the trees on the mountain. I had once feared that the dark clouds would evaporate and so would I. But look—the undersides of the clouds were pink, pendulous, and erotic. And most wondrous of all: a golden vale lay beyond the opening of the mountains. In that golden place was the painter of this Utopia. I caught Lu Shing watching me with his pleased expression. It was as if he knew exactly what I was thinking.

“What do
you
say, Lucia?” my father said. “You are clearly taken with it.”

I gave a more intellectual appraisal: “It captures many moments, many emotions,” I began, looking at Lu Shing, “hope, love, and purity. I see in it immortality, neither beginning nor end. It seems to be saying all moments are immortal and will never disappear, nor will peace in the valley, or the strength of mountains, or the openness of the sky—”

I would have gone on but Father interrupted. “Lucia is given to peaks of emotion, and Lu Shing, your painting is the lucky recipient of that tonight.” Everyone laughed warmly. I felt my neck flush.

Father and Mother always ridiculed me when they thought I was too emotional. I had peaks and peaks of emotion, a mountain range of them. They believed I had to control them. Mother did hers into a stupor. But did Father control his orgiastic peaks?

“I am lucky, indeed,” Lu Shing said. “The truth is, I had the grandiose intention of capturing one moment of immortality and I believed I had failed. But Miss Minturn has lifted me with her compliment that I have captured all the moments of immortality. Truly, no artist can be more appreciative to hear that.”

The room became shinier. The crystal drops of the chandelier sparkled and flashed, the halos of candles grew long. The faces of others had changed into strangers, and only Lu Shing was familiar. That was the moment I was knocked nearly senseless. I had never known this feeling before, yet I recognized it as being felled by love.
I fought to remain calm in front of the others as I held on to my secret. I now noticed a small brass plaque on the bottom of the frame. I read it aloud.
“The Valley of Amazement.”
Murmurs went around about the suitability of the name.

“I thought so, too,” Lu Shing said, “when I came across its mention in a Chinese translation of a Sufi poem, “The Colloquy of the Birds.” I took the title without knowing what it actually referred to and discovered later that the Valley of Amazement is not a pleasant way station. It’s a place of doubt, and doubt is dangerous to a painter. So now I lack a title.”

Everyone protested the Sufi’s meaning. The Valley of Amazement aptly described the painting, someone said, and it bore no relation to the gloomier reference. “We are not Sufis,” Miss Maubert said.

They were wrong to discount his feelings of doubt so casually. If he had doubts, he had to confront them, knock them down, and wrestle them to see that they were not real. Otherwise, they would remain in his mind. I could help him do this, simply by being with him, showing him how his own confidence could conquer doubt. I had done so myself countless times, I would tell him.

The conversation moved on to other topics, and then the maid arrived to announce our dinner was ready. Lu Shing was seated on my side of the table but at the far end, closest to where Father sat at the head of the table. Between us were the ample opera singer and Mr. Beekins. My view of him was eclipsed by the mezzo-soprano’s breasts and voluminous hair. I was frustrated that I had been kept so far from him. Mr. Maubert was on my left side, and Miss Huffard was next to him. I looked around the table. The faces of the suffragette, Miss Maubert, and the astronomer were no longer engorged with adoration for Father. How strange this night was. The candles with their dense odor flickered as the cook set down a large leg of some animal swimming in larded gravy. When the opera singer sat back, I stole glances at Lu Shing’s smooth face and the shaved bareness of his scalp, his naked splendor. He did not glance down the table at me.

Doubt came. Perhaps he felt none of what had taken over my mind and body. I had drunk an elixir, and he had not tasted a drop. He might find white women unappealing. He might have been intimate with a hundred beautiful women of his own kind. I had fooled myself in my craving for affection.

Through this gray cloud, I heard chatter and Lu Shing’s voice rising above. The light in the room now had a greasy gleam. The conversation had moved to Mr. Bierstadt’s stay at the Cliff House, where he would have a superior view of the distant Farallon Islands on clear days. Lu Shing had already portaged Mr. Bierstadt’s trunks to the hotel and would prepare his traveling painter’s studio.

“I’ve stayed at the Cliff House,” Miss Pond said, “and each morning, when I looked out my window, I never ceased to be in wonder that the islands were twenty-seven miles away—except, of course, when I saw nothing but fog. Will you be staying there as well, Mr. Lu Shing?”

“An apprentice doesn’t have the luxury,” he said. “I found a small boardinghouse close to the Cliff House.”

“You should stay with us,” I said quickly. “We have plenty of room.”

Mother looked surprised, and Father instantly agreed. “You must.”

“We often have guests,” I added. “Isn’t that so, Mother?”

She nodded, and others agreed that he would be more comfortable. Lu Shing politely declined until Father said he would enjoy showing Lu Shing his entire collection of paintings while he was our guest.

Mother called the maid over and told her to freshen the blue room. That was the guest room on the south side of the second floor. Mine was on the north, and, of course, the turret was just above.

“Mother,” I said, “I think Lu Shing would enjoy staying in the turret. It’s small, but it has the best view of the Bay.” Father hailed that as an excellent suggestion. Miss Pond volunteered to take Lu Shing in her carriage so he could fetch his things from the boardinghouse. I searched for signs that she wanted to seduce him. But then my father offered to accompany them.

Early the next morning, Lu Shing and my parents were already seated in the breakfast room when I arrived. How had they all known to rise early and why was I not told? I was excited to see his Chinese face. But then I noticed something was missing. He was wearing ordinary clothes: dark trousers, a white shirt and gray waistcoat. I wished he would change back into the Chinese garments. On the other hand, I enjoyed looking at his godlike physique. He was taller than father, who was of average height.

“Everyone who sails to the Farallons wants to see the sea lions, whales, and dolphins along the way,” I heard Mother say. “That’s the spectators’ experience.” She had her precious book of illustrated birds on the table. “I think that the variety of birds on the islands is far more interesting. Mr. Bierstadt evidently thinks so, too, since he painted many during his last visit. Among my favorites is the Cassin’s Auklet, which look quite ordinary from a distance, fat and molelike, until you know what to notice as you draw closer. The bluish feet, the white spot over the eye, and the rounded head and thin beak. That’s the challenge with birds—to notice the details and their differences—those of murres, puffins, cormorants—” I had not seen my mother this animated in a long time.

Father broke in. “Harriet, you should accompany Mr. Bierstadt and our young friend on their voyage to the Farallons. They could use your sharp eye.”

Mother was both surprised and flattered. She clearly liked the idea.

”I know Mr. Bierstadt would appreciate it very much,” Lu Shing said. “But only if you can spare the time.”

“I would enjoy a day of bird-watching as well!” I said.

Mother gave me a skeptical eye. “You suffer from seasickness.”

“I would suffer to see the birds,” I said. “You know I’ve always had an interest in birds.” She gave me another doubtful look.

“There’s time for me to study them ahead of time as well.”

That night, I squirmed in bed, debating whether to sneak up the curling stairs to the turret. Lu Shing was sleeping right above me. I imagined him sprawled on the bed with moonlight washing over his naked body. What excuses could I use to enter the room: a desire to see a ship coming into the Bay, the moon, the stars, a book I had been reading and left behind? And then I remembered that there was, in fact, just such a book.
Classical Anatomy of Calisthenics.
A thrill ran through me and throbbed in my center. The next day, while Lu Shing was at the Cliff House setting up Mr. Bierstadt’s painting studio, I darted up to the turret to find the pictorial book. I had tucked it under the feather bed. There it was. I pulled it out. I put it in the bookshelf, halfway pulled out. After fifty-two pages, he would be more than happy to welcome me.

The next morning, I greeted Lu Shing in the breakfast room. He was friendly, but he did not give me fond looks or secret smiles, nothing like those Miss Pond gave my father. He must not have seen the calisthenics guide to love.

“I have a collection of favorite books in the turret,” I said. “You’re welcome to read any of them.” I looked for telltale signs that he had already.

“Thank you. For the moment, I am reading as much as I can about the Farallon Islands and Yosemite.”

“I think we have an excellent book on Yosemite. Look through the little bookcase in the loft.”

We went directly from breakfast to Mother’s study. She sat in one corner, scrutinizing her bugs, and we sat kitty-corner from her at a letter-writing table. The large illustrated book of birds lay between us. We dutifully noted coloration, shapes of beaks, wingspan, and tail length—a hundred details that provided opportunity for conversation consisting of: “That tail is longer than this one.”

He turned pages to the right, and I turned pages to the left. I gave him my strongest flirtatious look: a glance over my shoulder with my eyes cast downward before they slowly rose and fixed on him. He returned a simple smile. Twice I made it seem that I had accidentally brushed my arm against his. He pulled away and apologized. When speaking to him about wingspan or migratory paths, I drew close to his face and whispered, purportedly so as not to disturb my mother’s important work. I saw no signs of interest from him and grew more disheartened by the hour.

“Lucia,” my mother called out, “don’t rest your elbows on the pages.”

I quickly leaned back and felt the flush of humiliation rise up my neck.

Lu Shing turned to me and said. “Lucia, Lu Shing. So similar. You Americans call it coincidence. We Chinese call it fate.”

CHAPTER
13

F
ATA
M
ORGANA

San Francisco
1897
Lucia Minturn

Three days before the scheduled voyage to the Farallon Islands, Mr. Bierstadt sent a hasty note of apology to our house, saying that he had to return to New York because his wife’s illness had worsened.

“Consumption,” Lu Shing said, “that is the rumor and concern.”

My parents made murmurs of sympathy for the master painter. I silently cursed him. There would be no more bird studies, no romantic voyage.

“What are your plans?” Father asked Lu Shing.

“My family has been asking for the past year when I would return, and I can finally give them the answer they’ve longed to hear.”

China. He was going to step back into the fairy-tale book, the covers would close, and that would be the end of the tale between Lucia and Lu Shing. Until now, it had not occurred to me that he would one day make the migratory return. If only he knew what was at stake for me, why I needed to escape to the green valley, wherever and whatever that was. I lived in a madhouse with soulless people. A mother who was in love with the bodies of insects. A grandmother who started the fires of argument. A grandfather who wandered useless with sufficient wealth. A father who disbursed affection into the voracious vulvas of women outside this house. These were the lunatics who sat around the table, airing superiority at dinner, where Father presided like Sophocles chewing a pork chop,
directing a debate about the meaningless parsing of art. I had to resist letting them change me, humiliate me, tamp down my emotions.

Our names, Lucia, Lu Shing. He said it was fate. But I was mistaken. He did not mean we would cling together from those words forward. Fate blew us together, two grains in a cloud of pollen, and then it blew us apart. I had counted on too much because of my peaks of emotion. I was the fool, now overwrought.

I heard Lu Shing speaking about his disappointment in not being able to study with Mr. Bierstadt. He mentioned a mundane matter—settling the hotel bill and removing Mr. Bierstadt’s belongings, booking passage on a boat to Shanghai, preferably via a fast route. He believed there was one leaving in a week. Mother asked if I was ill. I nodded, grateful for the excuse to leave before my face turned blotchy with shame. I went quickly to my room and sat at my desk to write down quickly what I was already losing.

The whole of me was contained in that painting. I cannot adequately explain it in words, except that knowledge of my Self-Being is already slipping away from view, and soon all that will remain are these words. I had felt my soul and now it is barely remembered—all of me at once that was truth, purity, strength, what was unchangeable and original, no matter how much was quashed and ridiculed by others. I wanted its creator, the mirage maker. I wanted him to show me his doubts, so I could show him mine, and together we could find the real valley and not just the one in the painting, but a real valley between two mountains, away from the mad world.