Three Souls (29 page)

He says nothing, but the sour, unripe plums in my mouth tell me my
yang
soul isn’t so forgiving.

We watch my memory-self fumble through farewell kisses, her flushed face and parted lips, the feral shine of her eyes. Hanchin, expert and restrained, gives me a final caress and a gentle push out the bookshop door.

And now?
my
hun
soul asks.
What do you feel now?

Now I’d give anything just to be alive again, passing each day in quiet contentment with my child and my husband.

***

My small world was entirely contained within walls and courtyards, where any change in routine was noticed and any departure from ordinary behaviour cause for concern. Now I had to deceive my husband and family to be with Hanchin. Spots of fever rose on my cheeks whenever I remembered his touch. I wanted to inhabit a world only large enough to contain the two of us, and then return to my normal life. But how could I do this without losing my daughter or hurting Baizhen? I wavered, all the while stumbling closer to a fork in the road from which there would be no turning back.

When Baizhen came to my bed at night, I clutched at him urgently. Although he expressed surprise and pleasure at my ardour, his body couldn’t fulfill my needs. The darkness obscured my grimaces of frustration at his clumsy caresses, his too-moist lips, his limbs that always seemed to jab me in all the wrong places. When he left my room, I lay awake in despair, desperate to find a time and place to be alone with Hanchin.

Over the next few days, I floated through the hours lost in my scheming, devising and discarding one ruse after another. There were times when I was irritable, impossible to please. On those days, I snapped at the most innocuous of comments.

“For women, an even temper is evidence of good breeding,” Jia Po said sternly, after I had reduced Little Ming to tears. She was upset with me, for she was fond of Little Ming. “It’s difficult to sleep in such hot weather, Daughter, but don’t allow your tiredness to affect your conduct, especially with the servants.”

“I’m sorry, Mother. But you’re right. I’ve hardly slept in days.” I was relieved that she attributed my erratic mood to insomnia.

“I’ll have Mrs. Kwan make some sweet-date syrup for us after supper. It will help us all sleep better.”

***

Then the gods cleared my path.

“It’s time to sell Infant Mountain,” Gong Gong announced. “We’ll go to Shanghai and place an advertisement in the newspaper. We’ll stay for two weeks, or until a buyer contacts us. It’s easier to have a first meeting right there in Shanghai.”

By “we,” he meant himself and Baizhen. I couldn’t have cared less about Infant Mountain. All I knew was that with two members of the family away, there would be fewer people to deceive.

I copied down Gaoyin’s address in Shanghai for Gong Gong and begged him and Baizhen to pay my sister a visit. I knew Gaoyin and Shen would invite them to stay at their spacious apartment. With expenses reduced, it was more likely that Gong Gong would linger in Shanghai.

A day later, Little Ming came to see me, twisting her handkerchief. Her mother was very ill.

“Please, Young Mistress, I’d like to go home at night to take care of my mother. I’m her only daughter and my brothers all work at night with their rickshaws. It’s their busiest time, that’s when the drunken gentlemen need to be taken home.”

“As long as you come back in the mornings before Weilan gets up.” I tried to sound sympathetic, not jubilant. I would have sent her away for a month if it were possible. Now, except for Weilan, my house would be empty each night for at least a week, perhaps two, if Little Ming’s mother was slow to recover.

I blessed the fact that no one in the main house could see or hear anything beyond the moon gate of our courtyard. I thanked the gods for the unfortunate circumstances that had left the cottage in the orchard abandoned and empty. It was destiny, I thought. Fate had finally rewarded me. My love for Hanchin, so long unrequited, had been sanctioned by the gods.

At the train station, I bade farewell to Baizhen and Gong Gong, my face cheerful as I wished them luck selling Infant Mountain. Weilan and I stood on the platform for a long time. She insisted on waving until the train was out of sight. Then we went home and I waited for the afternoon, when Jia Po and Weilan took their naps.

I stole into Old Ming’s storage room with an empty Tiger Balm tin and came out with the small red container full of heavy grease. I looked in on Weilan, who was fast asleep. Little Ming would be in the kitchen helping with the servants’ meal while Old Kwan prepared ours. I hurried through the orchard, where the leafy branches hung low, heavy with near-ripe fruit and scented with peach and pear, hints of the sweetness to come.

The orchard’s eastern wall held a heavy wooden door that squealed when I pushed it open. I smeared the latch and hinges with grease, then tested the door a few times to work the lubricant deeper into the rusty metal joints. This side door was the one Baizhen had used when he was a boy, to slip in and out of the house unnoticed. Then I turned my attention to the old cottage, greasing its door as well.

When I had finished, I wiped my hands on a rag, then hid it with the Tiger Balm tin behind some hydrangea shrubs. I left the orchard and went into the tiled bathing room, washed my hands, scrubbed the black grease from under my fingernails, and smoothed down my hair.

***

The thought of seeing Hanchin again carried my feet skimming over the walkways and bridges. A string bag slung over my arm held a few paper twists filled with dried herbs, my excuse for the outing. A heavy key wrapped in a sheet of notepaper weighed down one of my skirt pockets.

I pushed open the shop door. Hanchin sat behind the desk that served as a sales counter, facing two young men in long, loose gowns. They looked up as the door opened, caution on their faces. Hanchin smiled and nodded his head to greet me. I was just another customer. He continued talking to the young men while I feigned interest in the children’s books at the front of the shop.

Finally I heard Hanchin say in an exaggerated voice, “I’ll send you a note, sir, as soon as the next issue of
Analects Fortnightly
arrives. Please, look around the shop while I assist this lady.”

But the men murmured their goodbyes, the brass bells jangled, and in the silence my breathing quickened.

“Do you need help?” A young man in a pressed white shirt came out from the storeroom.

“No, Manager Wang,” replied Hanchin. “There’s only one customer here now. Please don’t trouble yourself.”

Young Wang bowed slightly in my direction. I nodded. He vanished through the curtains, back into the storeroom.

“Alas, the store is busy today.” Hanchin touched my face with one finger and grinned. I pressed his hand to my cheek and then kissed his palm. There was a smudge of blue ink on one of his knuckles and I kissed that as well.

“It doesn’t matter,” I said, breathless with daring. “I’ve found a way for us to be together. My husband and father-in-law are in Shanghai for two weeks. Here. I’ve explained what to do. Tonight. Please.”

I pressed the key and the note into his hand.

The bells rang noisily on my way out, but they were not half as loud as the ringing in my heart.

***

My brisk walk to the shops and back should have been exhausting in such hot weather, but I was exhilarated and alert. My mind spun like a water wheel through a cascade of possibilities. Weilan slumbered soundly every night, the sweet, undisturbed sleep of a happy child. Jia Po used a chamber pot, so she had no reason to leave her room, let alone her house, at night. Nonetheless I had to minimize my risk of being caught. I brewed red-date syrup for Jia Po and Weilan to drink after supper, added some herbs.

“It’s been hard trying to sleep in this heat,” I said. “We can all use some help.”

I forced myself to wait beside Weilan’s bed until her breathing grew deep and regular. Then I returned to my own room and sat in front of my dressing-table mirror. I fussed with my hair, combing out my long tresses and wishing I had a short, stylish cut with a permanent wave. I dabbed orange blossom water behind my ears and, brazenly, I thought, between my breasts. My cheeks needed no extra colour.

Then I waited in the dark for the streets outside to grow quiet, listened to the last drunkard singing his way home, the rasping of gates being pulled shut. I became aware for the first time of the animal sounds that filled the night, the sudden, soft thud of moths when they careened into a window, the scuffling of small creatures travelling through shrubbery.

Finally I heard what I had been waiting for, footsteps that would have been inaudible to anyone not listening for them, then a quiet scraping sound.

I threw a deep blue robe over my white nightclothes and hurried along the veranda. I stepped down to the courtyard and followed the path toward the outhouse. The courtyard was flooded by moon-light, empty and silent but for the singing of a lone cicada. A row of pink and white oleanders, their leaves dense and vibrant, screened the small building. From there it was only a few steps to the orchard door, all hidden from view, only a second or two when I could be seen.

I stayed close to the sheltering orchard wall, then ducked through, into the quiet welcome of fruit trees and Hanchin’s embrace.

“What now, Leiyin?” His voice was teasing. “Do I make love to you under the pears and peaches?”

“I’ve made ready the cottage,” I said, inwardly afraid of abandoning all restraint, of crying out my need for him to the night sky.

Inside, I reached into the drawer of the old table, found matches, and lit a small stub of candle, which I set down on a broken tile. He never took his eyes off me. He smiled, candlelight flickering over his face, his eyes glinting.

“I would’ve taken you under the trees outside, under the moonlight. How beautiful you look with your hair down.”

Suddenly I felt shy. “I have a quilt for the floor. And a sheet. I’m sorry but the bed’s too old.”

I pulled out the rolled-up bedding from where I’d hidden it at the back of the ancient wardrobe amid a jumble of moth-eaten pillows and blankets. We spread it out on the floor. I sat down and looked up at Hanchin. Then he knelt beside me.

I was a married woman. My husband came often to my bed for the game of clouds and rain. But that night I realized that what I knew about the pleasures of the bedchamber wouldn’t have filled a thimble.

I’d been prepared to endure Hanchin’s weight on my body, his hands groping my breasts and buttocks, the sharp thrusts of his manhood. The only pleasure I expected for myself was the closeness of his body to mine, knowing that I had satisfied him. I wasn’t ready for the satisfaction of my own needs, for the skilful caresses that made my body arch against his.

“Does this please you, Leiyin? And what about this, how does
this
please you?” he whispered. I could only gasp in reply.

Until a beggar eats her fill she doesn’t realize how hungry she’s been all her life.

***

Immoral. Utterly immoral and shameful,
my
yang
soul mutters. He stalks away to the far end of the terrace. But I smile because my mouth fills with the seductive taste of ripe fruits: sweet plums and cherries.

Hanchin was so desirable.
My
yin
soul stretches, arching her back—a bit voluptuously for one so young, I think.

And so experienced,
I say, suddenly recognizing what I had witnessed.
Why didn’t I ask myself how he knew so much about giving pleasure?

Because you believed it was love that made the difference,
says my
hun
soul.
You thought it was love that made your bodies so pleasing to each other. It’s understandable because sometimes it’s true.
It gives me a patronizing tap on the head.

In this case, was it true? Did he love me? He must have loved me, to risk a rendezvous when there was so much at stake. Not just us, but also his manuscript.

My souls don’t reply and the memories flow on.

***

“I loved you the moment I saw you, Hanchin. How did you feel about me?”

“I couldn’t stop thinking about you.” Again, a mischievous note.

I covered his face with kisses. “Even though we barely had any time alone, every time we met, I felt more certain you cared. Why did you leave Changchow? I ran away from home to find you and you were gone.”

“Your brother told me about your marriage the day I got the offer to teach. I left because I had the chance to make a difference. Directly, not just through my writing.”

“I would have gone with you.” I insisted, filled with regrets. “I wanted to be a teacher, to be worthy of your love. To be a partner who could work with you to transform China. I would have used my dowry to help you set up schools for peasants.”

“A nice dream.” Condescending. As though teasing a child.

“Yes, a dream, because my father never would have let me marry you,” I said, somewhat annoyed at his tone. “So why did you flirt with me?”

He kissed me again, caressed my thighs. “Let’s just say I couldn’t help myself. You were so . . . irresistible.” His low laughter, my helpless need for his touch.

I rested my head against his chest, tucked myself under his chin.

“Tell me everything, from the time you left Changchow.”

I learned that for a year he had lived in Soochow, using it as a base for travelling to small towns and rural communities in Jiangsu province. Then for a while he ran a school in Jiangxi province, where he and an assistant taught adult peasants how to read.

“I could have been of use,” I said, envious of the person who had worked alongside him. “I’ve devised ways to teach my . . . to teach adults how to read. With methods more suitable than lessons designed for children.”

“Alas, that school is no more,” he said lightly. “We ran out of funds. But I’m not surprised you found a way to put your ambitions to work.”

I glowed from his approval. “Do you remember the last letter you sent me? You wrote that the most important thing was to keep seeking knowledge. Even here, in this small town, I read everything I can find.”