Imperial Woman (26 page)

“Tell her,” Su Shun said arrogantly, “that I and Prince Yi were appointed Regents by the Son of Heaven himself before his spirit left us. Say that we come to announce ourselves to her.”

The Chief Eunuch made obeisance, saying nothing, but he hastened to do what he was told. Yet on the way he paused to whisper his business to Jung Lu, who waited on guard.

Jung Lu took command at once. “Proceed as quickly as you can to bring the Three to the Empress Mother. I’ll hide myself outside the door and the moment that they leave I’ll enter.”

Meanwhile Tzu Hsi sat in her own palace hall, white-robed from head to foot, her headdress white, her shoes white, to signify the deepest mourning. Thus she had sat since the announcement of the Emperor’s death. She had not eaten food nor drunk tea. Her hands were folded in her lap, her great eyes fixed on distance. Her ladies, standing near, wept and wiped their eyes upon their silken kerchiefs. But she did not weep.

When the Chief Eunuch came she heard him, and still gazing far off she spoke wearily, as though a duty pressed her that she would be rid of.

“Bring the Grand Councilor Su Shun here, and with him the Princes Cheng and Yi. Tell these three great ones that surely my lord, now dwelling in the Yellow Springs, must be obeyed.”

He went, and in less time than can be told, she saw the Grand Councilor come in, and with him the two Princes. She turned her head and spoke softly to her favorite, Lady Mei, who was Su Shun’s daughter.

“Leave us, child. It is not seemly that you stand here by me in the presence of your father.”

She waited until the slender girl had slipped away. Then she accepted the obeisances of the Princes, and to show that she was not proud, now that her lord was dead, she rose and bowed to them in turn and sat down again.

But Su Shun was proud enough for two. He stroked his short beard and lifted his head to look at her with eyes bold and arrogant. She noted very well this breach of propriety, but she did not speak to correct it.

“Lady,” he said, “I come to announce the Decree of Regency. In his last hour the Son of Heaven—”

Here she stopped him. “Wait, good Prince. If you have a parchment, and it bears his imperial signature, I will obey his will, in duty.”

“I have no parchment,” Su Shun said, “but I have witnesses. Prince Yi—”

Again she stopped him. “I have such a parchment, signed in my own presence and in the presence of many eunuchs.”

She looked about to find the Chief Eunuch, but that prudent fellow had stayed outside the doors, not wishing to be present when the tigers met. She was not daunted. She drew from her bosom the parchment which the dying Emperor’s hand had signed. In a smooth calm voice, every word distinct as the stroke of a silver bell, she read the decree from the beginning to the end, while Su Shun and the two Princes listened.

Su Shun pulled at his beard. “Let me see the signature,” he snarled.

She held the parchment where he could see the name.

“There is no seal,” he cried. “A decree without the imperial seal is worthless.”

He did not wait to hear her answer or even to see the look of consternation on her face. He turned and fled, the princes his following shadows. She knew at once what made their haste. The imperial seal was locked within its coffer in the death chamber. Whoever seized it first was victor. She gnashed her teeth against herself that she had not waited for the seal. She tore the headdress from her head and threw it on the floor, she pulled her ears with both her fists and was beside herself with rage.

“Stupid!” she shrieked against herself. “Oh, stupid, stupid woman, I, and more stupid Prince, who did not warn me early, and stupid kinsman and treacherous eunuchs who did not help me sooner! Where is the seal?”

She ran to the door and jerked it open, but no one stood outside, no Chief Eunuch, not even Li Lien-ying. There was none here to give chase.

She threw herself upon the floor and wept. The years were lost, she was betrayed.

At this moment Lady Mei, peeping through brocaded curtains, saw her mistress lying there as dead and she ran in and knelt beside her.

“Oh, Worshipful,” she moaned, “are you wounded? Did some one strike you?”

She tried to lift her weeping mistress but she could not and so she ran to the door still open and met there Jung Lu, and behind him the eunuch Li Lien-ying, just now arrived.

“Oh,” she cried and shrank back, her blood flooding upward from her heart into her cheeks. But Jung Lu did not see her. He carried something in his hands, a lump wrapped in yellow silk.

He set it down when he saw the graceful figure lying on the stones, and he stooped and lifted the Empress in his arms and looked into her face.

“I have brought the seal,” he said.

She got to her feet then, and he stood tall and straight beside her, his countenance grave as was its habit nowadays. And he, avoiding her direct gaze, took up the seal again in both his hands, a solid rock of jade whereon was deeply carved the imperial symbol of the Son of Heaven. This was the seal of the Dragon Throne and had been for eighteen hundred years and more, designed by the command of Ch’in Shih-huang, then ruling.

“I heard Su Shun,” he said, “while I stood at the door to guard you. I heard him cry out that the parchment bore no seal. It was a race between us. I went one way and sent your eunuch by another to hold him if he reached the death chamber first.”

Here Li Lien-ying, always eager to claim a prize for himself, put in his own tale.

“And I took a small eunuch with me, Venerable, and I crept into the death chamber through a vent, for you know the great gate is padlocked for fear of robbers in this wild country, and while the little eunuch watched, I went through head first and I smashed the wooden coffer with a vase of jade, and took out the seal. The little eunuch pulled me through again, even as I heard the Princes at the lock and forcing the key into the hole, and I wish that I could have stayed to see their faces when they saw the empty coffer!”

“Now is no time for laughter,” Jung Lu said. “Empress, they will try to take your life, since they have not destroyed your power.”

“Do not leave me,” she implored him.

Tzu Hsi’s woman had all this time been standing at the door, her ear pressed against the panel. Suddenly she opened it. Prince Kung came in, his face pale, his robes wrapped about him for swiftness.

“Venerable,” he cried, “the seal is gone! I went myself to the death chamber and ordered the guards to open the doors that I might go in. But the doors were open already at the order of Su Shun, and when I went in the coffer was empty.”

He stopped. At this moment his eyes fell on the imperial seal covered with yellow silk. His jaw dropped, his dark eyes opened, the tip of his tongue touched his upper lip in a rare smile.

“Now I see,” he said, “now I know why Su Shun says that such a woman as you must be killed or she will rule the world.”

They looked at one another, Empress, Prince and eunuch, and they broke into triumphant mirth.

The imperial seal was hidden underneath Tzu Hsi’s bed and the rose-red satin curtains overhung it, so that in the whole palace only she and her woman and her eunuch knew it was there.

“Do not tell me where it is hidden,” Prince Kung had commanded. “I must be able to say I do not know.”

With the imperial seal secure, she could do as she wished. Her fever left her and peace took the place of restlessness. She could and did ignore the ferment in the palace when it was known that the seal was gone, and none knew where. All guessed that she had taken it, and courtesy and obedience took the place of creeping impudence and growing arrogance. Her three enemies kept far from her, and well she knew that they were beside themselves, since they could not carry out their plot. Amid this confusion and consternation she went sweetly and at ease and her first deed was to send her eunuch to thank the Lady Yi for caring for her son, and to assure her that she would not put this trouble elsewhere, for she could care for him herself, since now, to her grief, her time was no more needed for the Emperor. So was restored to her the Heir.

Her next deed was to go weeping to her cousin, there to sit beside her, and tell her how the Emperor had decreed that they two should be the Regents while the Heir was yet a child. “You and I, dear Cousin,” she said, “will now be sisters. Our lord willed us to be united for his sake, and I swear my loyalty and love to you so long as we both live.”

She took Sakota’s little hand and smiled tenderly into the wistful face, and how could Sakota dare to make reply? She smiled back again, half gratefully, and with something like her old childish honesty she said:

“To tell the truth, Cousin, I am glad to be friends.”

“Sisters,” Tzu Hsi said.

“Sisters then,” Sakota amended, “for I always feared that Su Shun. His eyes are fierce and shifty, and though he promised me very much, I never knew—”

“Did he promise?” Tzu Hsi inquired too gently.

Sakota flushed. “He said that while he was regent, I was always to be called the Empress Dowager.”

“And I was to be put to death, was I not?” Tzu Hsi asked in the same quiet voice.

“To that I never did agree,” Sakota said too quickly.

Tzu Hsi maintained her usual courtesy. “I am sure you did not and now all can be forgot.”

“Except—” here Sakota hesitated.

“Except?” Tzu Hsi demanded.

“Since you know much,” Sakota said, unwillingly, “you must know that it was their plot to kill all foreigners everywhere in our nation, and put to death, too, the brothers of the Emperor who would not take their side in the plot. The edicts for these deeds are written and ready for the seal.”

“Indeed, and is it so?” Tzu Hsi murmured, smiling, but in her heart aghast. How many lives had she saved besides her own!

She pressed Sakota’s hand between her hands. “Let us have no secrets from each other, Sister. And fear nothing, for these plotters do not have the imperial seal, and so these edicts which they planned are nothing. Only that one who has the ancient seal, which has come down to us from the Ancestor Ch’in Shih-huang himself, and upon which are carved the words ‘Lawfully Transmitted Authority,’ can claim succession to the Dragon Throne.”

She looked so high and pure and calm that Sakota dared not put a question as to that seal and where it was now. She bowed her head and murmured in a faint voice, “Yes, Sister.” She put her kerchief to her lips and touched her eyelids, and said, “Alas—alas,” to signify her grief that her lord was dead, and upon this Tzu Hsi took her leave and all was amity.

While the days passed until she must return to the capital she had only to await the further revelations of her enemies, and this she did with calm spirit, tinged with private mirth. But of such hidden mischief she showed nothing. Outwardly she was grave as a good widow should be and she wore white robes and put aside her jewels.

Meanwhile Prince Kung returned to the capital, there to prepare a special truce with the enemy which would allow the return of the dead Emperor for his imperial funeral.

“I have but one warning,” Prince Kung told her in parting. “Do not, Majesty, allow any meeting between yourself and your kinsman, the Commander of the Guard. Who can value his loyalty and his courage more than I do? Yet enemies will have their eyes upon you now to see if there be truth in old gossip. Instead, put your trust in the Chief Eunuch, An Teh-hai, who gives his service whole to you and to the Heir.”

Tzu Hsi cast reproachful looks upon the Prince. “Do you think me stupid?”

“Forgive me,” he said, and these were his parting words.

Although she did not need it, yet his advice was good for her against temptation. For she was woman, and her heart was hot, and now that the Emperor was dead she did often in the night let her wild and secret thoughts go creeping through dark corridors and lonely halls and past empty rooms to that gate lodge where the Imperial Guard was stationed. There she found him whom she loved and her thoughts circled about him like mourning doves, remembering him as he had been when they were children, he always tall and straight, inclined to stubbornness, it was true, never yielding unless it was his will to yield, stronger than she, however strong she was, handsome then as now, but male, and never delicate or womanish, as the poor Emperor had been. Against such thoughts and memories, it was well that she had Prince Kung’s warning, a shield to keep her from her own desire. She made her outer calm invincible, while within the fire burned.

And indeed she could not indulge her heart. Her task was still not finished. She must not give comfort to her enemies, nor freedom to herself until the Throne was hers, to hold for her son. She must exert her every charm, her dignity and courtesy toward everyone, and so well she did this that all except her enemies were drawn to her, and especially the soldiers of the Imperial Guard to whom she granted gifts and kindness, without once seeming to show a difference between these men and their commander. To them, too, she sent her daily thanks for their protection of the imperial corpse.

Meanwhile she took for her own ally the Chief Eunuch, An Teh-hai, and he was near her always as he had once been to the Emperor. From him she heard the troubles of her enemies, and how distracted the Three were, and their followers with them. For on the day after the imperial death they had sent out edict declaring themselves appointed Regents by the Emperor on his deathbed and she was forbidden any part in government. The next day, however, when they could not find the seal, they made haste to placate her, and sent out another edict proclaiming the Consorts both Empress Dowagers.

“This, Venerable,” the Chief Eunuch told her, chortling and snickering, “is not so much that you are the mother of the new Emperor, but because you have won to your side the Manchu soldiers who guard this palace.”

Tzu Hsi’s smooth cheeks dimpled. “Am I still to be killed?” she inquired too innocently.

“Not until they are sure of their place in the capital.”

They laughed and parted, he to make his report to Prince Kung by daily courier, and she to play her part of lovely woman. When she met by chance any of the Three, her courtesy was so perfect, her manner so indifferent to her danger, that Prince Yi at least could not believe she knew them still plotters.