The Palace of Heavenly Pleasure (86 page)

*   *   *

Henry sat in the next-door room, guarding Mother Liu. She, too, was sleeping, her rasping snores muffled only slightly by her gag, which he had loosened so she would not suffocate. Fan Yimei was with him. Although they had much to say to each other, neither wanted to say it, so they sat in uncomfortable silence. Once Henry broached the subject they had last discussed fruitlessly on their final ride together before they were captured at the railway yard. ‘You know that you don't owe me anything?' he said.

‘If you say so, Ma Na Si,' she had replied quietly.

‘For helping the boy, I mean,' he had continued.

‘I understand,' she had answered.

‘A lot has happened since then,' he said. ‘It would never have worked.'

‘Yes, I understand,' she had replied.

He had relapsed into silence.

‘You must not blame yourself for what happened today,' she said. ‘It is honourable to try to save a life, especially if it involves sacrifice. Your lady, too, was brave.'

‘You know, I never intended…' He started, but could not finish the painful sentence.

‘You were not to know what would happen,' she said. ‘The blame does not belong to you. And the lady, she will heal in time. And she may forgive you, if she is wise.'

‘The doctor will never forgive me.'

‘He has never suffered before,' she said. ‘He was wise, but only in the wisdom of the daylight, where certainties glisten brightly in the sunshine. He was a healer, and believed he could cast his light into the darkest corners. But now he is challenged by another wisdom, that of the night, in which there is no light and where nothing is certain … It is hard for him.'

‘It is you who are wise,' he said softly.

‘I have learned what sorrow is,' she smiled, ‘yet I continue to live. Is that wise?'

‘That's nonsense,' he muttered. She did not answer. ‘You know that the Mandarin may not send for us today?' he said.

‘It is better to believe he will,' she said.

‘Yes,' he said. ‘It is his messenger who concerns me. After what Lin did today I cannot let him live.'

‘Yet if you take Major Lin's life there will be no one to save yours.'

‘Tricky, isn't it?' said Henry. ‘I'm not sure I'll be able to control myself when I see him.'

‘You will,' she said. ‘For you, unlike the doctor, are wise in the wisdom of the night.'

‘Am I?' he said.

‘You have always shown yourself to be so. Ma Na Si, when are you going to ask me to go below?'

‘Could I ask you that? Wouldn't it be dangerous? With Iron Man Wang and his men on the prowl?'

‘Yet if I do not go, who will lead Major Lin here? The Mandarin will have asked Mother Liu to see to it. They went to the gate together and he would have told her his plans. I imagine that it was her intention to inform Ren Ren and that was why she was looking for him when she and the doctor had their struggle. Unless someone is there to meet Major Lin, and inform him of the latest situation, then I fear that our plans may go awry.'

‘Cannot the girl, Mary, bring him?'

‘No, Ma Na Si. She will be entertaining customers. I have told her to be ready to slip away after midnight when hopefully whoever she has been assigned will be sleeping, but we cannot rely on her any earlier. And Major Lin does not know her, or trust her, so it will be I who goes to the gate and waits.'

‘You are not afraid of meeting one of Iron Man Wang's men on the way down?'

‘I know how to handle such situations. Believe me.'

‘You're a remarkable woman,' said Henry. ‘You saved our lives today, and you're about to do so again.'

‘I killed two men,' she said sadly. ‘I will have to live with that shame.' She stood up abruptly. ‘Excuse me, Ma Na Si, but if I am to do this I must leave now.'

He bowed his head. He had nothing to say.

*   *   *

She slid into the dark corridor. From the stairwell she heard a burst of singing and the shouts of men challenging each other in a drinking game. She pressed the inside of her robe to check that she had not lost the pouch which she had found in Mother Liu's room, then slowly lifted the flap that covered the entrance to the stairs. She stepped into the corridor on the second floor. She could hear cries and laughter from the bedrooms on either side, but was relieved to see that the corridor itself was deserted. She hurried along it, but just as she reached the stairs she heard a shrill, jeering voice behind her. ‘Can I believe my eyes? What an honour! If it's not the precious Lady Fan Yimei!'

She turned, forcing a smile. Su Liping was standing in the doorway of one of the rooms. She was naked except for a skimpy
doudu
covering her breasts and abdomen. In her hand hung a pitcher of wine. From her red face and her slurred voice, Fan Yimei could see that she was drunk. This would normally have been against house rules, but Fan Yimei guessed that there was a different regime now that the brothel had been taken over by Iron Man and his followers.

‘So her superior ladyship has deigned to visit her humble sisters,' continued Su Liping, enjoying her own wit.

‘I have just been summoned to see Mother Liu,' said Fan Yimei quietly, ‘and was on my way downstairs.'

‘Oh, summoned, were you?' said Su Liping, in a parody of an affected voice. ‘How very grand. Summoned, is it?' She bowed in a mocking kowtow.

‘Who are you talking to?' Fan Yimei heard a rough voice from inside the room, and the figure of a man loomed behind Su Liping. She staggered aside to let him pass. He was also naked, a squat, bearded monstrosity, with a barrel chest. Fan Yimei had never in her life seen so much hair on a human body. With a shock, she recognised him. He was the bandit who had wielded an axe in Major Lin's pavilion in the morning.

‘I know you,' he said. ‘You're that stuck-up bitch who was with the Mandarin. You're pretty, though,' he added, surveying her carefully.

‘Oh, you can't touch her,' giggled Su Liping. ‘She's off-limits. She belongs to Major Lin. His personal property,' she said, in the same affected voice she had used earlier.

‘Is she now?' growled Iron Man. ‘We'll see about that. Come here,' he ordered.

Fan Yimei hesitated, wondering if she could ignore him and flee down the steps that beckoned behind her.

‘With deepest respects, Xiansheng,' she said, in an appeasing tone, ‘what Su Liping says is correct. I am under exclusive contract to Major Lin.'

‘Don't Xiansheng me,' snarled Iron Man. ‘I'm no Xiansheng. And I don't give a bugger for any contracts. I told you to come here.'

Fan Yimei realised that she had little choice but to obey. With as much grace as she could muster, smiling her most ingratiating smile, she moved towards him. She was startled when her arms were gripped by his two hairy paws. ‘Contracts,' he snorted, and pulled her robe off her shoulders. As she felt him grasp her breasts, she was relieved that the pouch still nestled above her waistband and had not fallen on the floor. ‘Nice little melons,' he was saying. ‘Bigger than yours,' he addressed a pouting Su Liping.

‘So you're Major Lin's girl,' he said, examining her. ‘He won't be around much longer, nor the precious Mandarin, though they don't know it yet. You're mine now, girl, for tonight or for however long it takes me to tire of you. Go on. Get into the bedroom.'

‘Oh, Iron Man,' whined Su Liping. ‘What about me?'

‘You can bugger off,' he snapped. ‘Or stay and watch. I don't care.'

Sullen-faced, Su Liping followed them into the room. She slumped onto a stool and tipped the wine pitcher to her throat.

‘Don't hog that, you greedy slut,' Iron Man shouted. ‘Give it to me.' He snatched the pitcher from Su Liping's trembling hands, and sat on the edge of the bed. ‘You,' he pointed at Fan Yimei. ‘Strip.' He took a long gulp from the pitcher.

Fan Yimei trembled in apparent uncertainty, averting her eyes bashfully and covering her breasts with her hands. Professionally, she had already sized up this unwelcome client. She had determined that coy modesty would be the right approach. For all his crudeness, she thought that what attracted Iron Man to her was her refinement. Clearly, he restented Major Lin, and by roughly taking his concubine he was asserting some sort of vengeance on the more privileged classes of society, and the pleasures that until now had been denied him. If she appeared too eager, he would not only be disappointed, he also might suspect a trick. She knew enough of this man's reputation not to underestimate him.

‘Shy, are you?' laughed Iron Man. ‘Why don't you take some fortification, then? You'll need it for what I'm about to do to you, my little lady. Here, catch.' Lightly he threw the heavy pitcher towards her. She caught it easily, but exaggerated the weight and pretended to stagger with the strain of holding such a heavy container.

‘Quite the little willow, aren't we?' sneered Iron Man.

‘Please, Xiansheng, I don't drink,' she said, in a beseeching tone.

‘You'll do what I tell you,' he shouted.

Fan Yimei made a pretence of trying to lift the pitcher. ‘It's so heavy,' she whimpered. ‘Can I—can I pour it into a cup?'

Iron Man roared with laughter. ‘Go on, then. Pour it into a cup. Give us the tea ceremony while you're about it.'

It had been much easier than she had imagined. She whispered a silent prayer to Guanyin for this stroke of luck. Carefully she placed the pitcher on the carpet behind the table so it was temporarily invisible to Iron Man Wang and Su Liping. She took a bowl from the chest, and leaned over the pitcher, tilting it to pour. As she did so she emptied into it the contents of the pouch. She stood up, lifting the bowl to her mouth, and sipped gingerly, making a sour expression as she felt the fiery liquid on her tongue. With her foot she kicked the now empty pouch out of sight under the table. Iron Man laughed to see the discomfort on her face. ‘Come on, empty the bowl,' he urged. Fan Yimei did so, making sure she coughed afterwards, inducing the tears that ran down her cheeks. She felt a moment's gratitude to Mother Liu for all the artifices she had so painstakingly taught her over the years.

‘Please. No more,' she whispered, reeling slightly. She hoped her cheeks were burning a bright red.

‘All right, give me back the pitcher. You want to see how to drink? This is how you drink,' he said, and gurgled half a pitcher's worth down in an extended gulp. ‘That's better,' he said, smacking his lips. ‘Now do what I told you to do. Strip.'

She had had worse clients. Patiently she made the desired sounds as the animal grunted over her. Out of the corner of her eyes she had the satisfaction of seeing Su Liping bad-temperedly picking up the pitcher, and retiring with it to her stool, drinking distractedly, occasionally directing peevish glances at the girl who had superseded her in the Boxer leader's affections. Fan Yimei lay under Iron Man Wang, moaning with assumed pleasure, and coolly calculated how long it would take for the sleeping draught to work. She was not overly concerned. There was still more than an hour before Major Lin was likely to appear.

Iron Man Wang shuddered, and rolled on to his back. ‘I've had better,' he yawned. ‘Get me the wine.' Fan Yimei was pleased to see that Su Liping was already asleep, her head back and her mouth open, snoring softly. She carried the pitcher to Iron Man, remembering to pretend that she was straining under its weight, although the container was now three-quarters empty. ‘The little bitch,' he murmured, lifting it to his mouth. ‘She's a worse tippler than some of my men. Let me rest a bit and then I'll do the two of you together. Twin Phoenixes Dancing? Isn't that what you call it?' He sat back on the bed, yawning.

Knowing that it would soothe him—and therefore help him to sleep more quickly, Fan Yimei overcame her disgust, and leaned over his loins, almost suffocating in his thick hairs, but moving her mouth as she had been trained. He grunted with pleasure. ‘Ye-es,' he breathed. ‘I like that. Ye-es.' She stopped when she heard him snore. She waited, then lightly smacked his cheek. There was no response.

Pausing only to swill out her mouth with cold tea from the pot on the table, she dressed quickly. She noticed Iron Man's huge axe leaning against the wall. She glanced at the sleeping figure. It would be so easy, she thought. She had already killed two men that day, and this was the Mandarin's enemy, as well as being the most serious threat to their own safety. She could save Shishan. No, she decided, there would be others to take his place. The world was full of monsters such as this, and the death of one would only bring the elevation of another, Besides, it was not in her nature to do such a thing. She could hardly believe she had fired the shots that had killed Ren Ren and Monkey. A part of her told her that if anybody deserved to die it was animals like them—and she had only done it to save the others—but she was deeply revolted with herself, and almost paralysed with remorse, and it took every effort of her will to keep going. But she could not let down the others, the children, the poor ravaged English girl, and Ma Na Si, whom she loved but who loved another. She thought of the Buddhist lore she had learned at her father's side. She was bound on the Wheel of Rebirth. What terrible lives she must have lived in her past incarnations that she was fated to suffer so much in this one. Her whole life had been one long-drawn-out expiation, but she feared that, for all her efforts, she was only gathering on her soul more sins she would have to expiate in future lives. She leaned her head against the door. Merciful Guanyin, she prayed, give me the strength to continue. She sighed. Iron Man and Su Liping snored in their different octaves behind her. She lifted the latch and stepped into the corridor.

The house was quiet now. She reached the stairs without incident, descending to the lower floor where the banqueting rooms were. The revellers had departed, the lights were extinguished. She stepped hesitantly into the darkness, feeling her way through the gloom towards the last ladder of stairs that led to the ground floor. She felt for the wall to guide herself, and gasped when she touched a human face. ‘
Jiejie,
it's me, Mali.'