Peach Blossom Pavilion (32 page)

Now a black-suited captain hurries to us, aims an ear-reaching grin at jade, then shows us to a table by the window. With a slick movement of his white-cuffed hand, he lights a candle on the whiteclothed table, then turns to ask me, "Old lady, what would you like to drink?"

Jade blurts out, "Stop calling her old lady, she's my grandmama and the last most famous ming ji in China!"

Heads turn and eyes rivet on me.

If this had happened eighty years ago, I'd have straightened my shoulders and thrown out my chest, then my tongue would have run along my lips while my eyes shot the onlookers soul-losing bul lets. But now I only wish that I had really learned the floating martial art so I could jump out of the window, fly up on the roof, and disappear into darkness.

Back home, I'm still hungry. For I'd already lost my appetite the moment my prestigious status was exposed in that fake restaurant. How ironic. Americans would die to become prestigious! Just look at how they worship celebrities!

Knowing that I'm upset, now Jane puts on a very sweet smile and says very gently, as if she were talking to her antique, cracked porcelain doll, "Grandmama, you want me to fix you something, Coke, cookies?"

"Do you really consider it fixing something to open a Coke and put cookies on a plate?"

But she doesn't answer my question, she is still busy smiling. "All right, all right, Grandmama, I'm sorry. Then why don't you tell us now about Big Master Fung and your love?"

"Yes, Grandmama, please." Leo immediately joins his beautiful, utterly spoiled princess in pleading.

"All right, then listen very carefully," I say, my ninety-eight-yearold heart secretly melting when my glance catches Leo's.

21

Melting the Ice

eedless to say, Fang Rong and Wu Qiang were insanely happy about the jewelry and cash that Pearl had left for them.

Mama laughed, the gold and diamond glittering in her pupils. "That was a really good, filial daughter, still thought of her parents even when she was going to die. Now I forgive her committing suicide. Ha! Ha! Ha!"

De chimed in, his hands sexually harassing a gold brooch (I was sure in his mind, he was now fondling it on Red Jade's breast). "She also chose the right moment to die-at her prime. Otherwise, in a few years she'd be too old to be a ming j: "

Mama interrupted. "Yes, how could we afford to keep her here if she couldn't bring in you-know-what? Who could blame us if no one is willing to pay for someone who's crack-eyed, chimneynosed, clang-eared, and stinks like a swine?"

The evil duo burst into laughter, their hands clutching Pearl's hard-earned jewelry, which, if broken open, would surely spill her blood and tears. I felt an impulse to grab her long gold necklace from Fang Rong's and Wu Qiang's evil fingers and strangle them with it.

It was obvious that Mama and De did not suspect that their filial daughter had also left part of her jewelry and money to me. I was grateful for Pearl's ingenuity. I now kept Pearl's qin in my own room and played it almost every day. Since my practice did not interfere with my bringing rich customers to Peach Blossom, Fang Rong and Wu Qiang never said anything to me about it. All the jewelry and money stayed safely inside the qin's resonance box.

People seemed to get over the shock of Pearl's death very quickly. Of course they still gossiped about her-why she'd killed herself; how she'd lost out in her rivalry with Red jade; how she'd gained her prestigious status by mastering both the technique of the pipa and the bedchamber; her rumored esoteric recipes for shrinking vaginas and enlarging jade stalks. But rarely did I hear laments that her life had been cut short by the evil of the human heart.

Now people's attention turned to Red Jade. Her pictures, together with poems praising her beauty and her talent in the erotic arts of pleasing, appeared frequently in the mosquito press and gossip magazines. One rumor went that one of the movie companies was seriously considering getting her out of Peach Blossom and making her into a star.

One time I overheard one customer say to another, "With those smiling eyes and swinging papayas, she'll be perfect to play the slut! "

The other burst into roaring laughter. "And I bet she'll become famous pretty quickly. For what star has the experience to play a whore as realistically as she! "

Every night music, laughter, and light spilled from Peach Blossom like water spurting from fountains. Long, shiny cars snaked to line up in front of the pavilion's crimson gate. Even the corners of the stone lions' lips seemed to be lifting higher and higher each day, welcoming the pilgrims' offerings pouring into their masters' safe.

Like Pearl, now I completely understood the cruelty of the human heart. But I had no intention to leave this jinfen diyu-Gold-Pow- dered Hell. Not yet. Not until I'd entirely won Fang Rong's and Wu Qiang's trust so they'd feel completely relaxed with me. I had to accord with the Tao-wait for the propitious moment-to carry out my plan.

I wouldn't survive failure.

A few weeks after Pearl's death, I dreamt that she, all dressed up in a red, gold-threaded gown, appeared in the distance whispering my name. Between us was suspended a bridge so entwined with thorns that neither of us could cross. Underneath the bridge a gravestone lay submerged in water with the inscription:

Pearl 1900-1923

Here lies a woman of prestige-poet, painter, prostitute

Clusters of plum blossoms floated around the grave, and from among the patches of pink, one white flower rose tall and high, nodding to me in the cold, bitter wind. I tried to approach Pearl, but she kept receding, while tenderly calling my name. Desperate, I leaped forward into the air, only to plunge toward her grave ...

I woke up soaking wet. The dream was so vivid that for a moment I believed I was really plunging down toward the lake with a worried-looking Pearl calling my name. I blinked several times to make sure I was in Peach Blossom, in my room with its solid wood furniture, gilded mirror, ceramic vases, and scrolls of paintings and calligraphy ...

As my mind was swaying between dream and reality, I heard a cheerful "good morning." I looked up and saw Plum Blossom. Soaked in rays of the morning sun, her beak looked so red and her feathers so white that I was reminded of "Nuer Hong-Daughter's Blush," a story I had heard from my mother.

A young father, after the birth of his first daughter, buried a big jar of wine in his garden. Nobody was allowed to even touch the jar-not until the baby had grown into a young girl and was betrothed. Sixteen years passed like a horse leaping across a ravine. On the daughter's wedding night, the father, now a middle-aged man, dug out the jar, broke the seal, and poured the velvety liquid for his guests. Seeing that the wine reflected the rouge on his beautiful daughter's face, the father named it Daughter's Blush.

My baba, right after I'd been born, had also stored a jar of wine for my wedding-one that had never happened.

Now I looked at Plum Blossom through my watery eyes and re turned her greeting. "Good morning." Then I got off the bed and went up to stroke her feathers, this time for Pearl.

Plum Blossom pecked my hand affectionately. Scurrying back and forth on the stand, I imagined she was practicing the qin's lingering tones with her feet, or even the shredded-golden-lotus steps demonstrated by Pearl. For a moment I smiled, then my sadness returned. I sat down at the table and started to grind ink, slowly and meditatively. Watching the shallow of the stone slab gradually fill with a widening pool of black, fragrant liquid, my heart was appeased. Next I spread out a sheet of rice paper printed with pale plum blossoms. I picked up my brush, dabbed it into the ink until the white tip was soaked black, then watched a poem bloom on the paper.