Taming Poison Dragons (14 page)

So we found ourselves waiting for our names to be called. P’ei Ti constantly straightened and smoothed his clothes. Every few minutes a major domo called out a candidate’s name who he ushered to the nearby hall. Some returned downcast, others jubilant. In this way two long hours passed. My own attention wandered, drawn by a painting of waterfalls and sages on the wall, an original by my beloved Master Xie-He, as was proved by numerous seals of former owners, all illustrious. The painting itself must have cost a prince’s ransom.

When my name was shouted out, I looked up in surprise. Uncle Ming poked me hard in the ribs, leapt to his feet and thrust me forward. At once I was nervous. A secretary led me to a high pair of purple doors. These opened onto a large audience-hall, its rafters painted in gay colours, walls adorned with frescos depicting the Son of Heaven’s ancestors. I advanced with bowed head, not daring to look at the man who waited on an ivory throne at the end of the hall, surrounded by friends and relatives.

The silence in the room broken only by my shuffling feet.

A dozen feet from his chair I sank to my knees and remained with head lowered. There was whispering around Lord Xiao, yet I could not look up. At last I heard him say out loud: ‘Ah, that one. The poet. Very well.’

More silence. He was clearly watching me.

‘I have heard of your father’s deeds,’ he said.

His voice was quiet and commanding, yet surprisingly high-pitched.

‘Such loyalty in the father speaks well for the son.’

I bowed lower in acknowledgement.

‘I also hear reports you are a poet. Indeed, I enjoyed your verses – and those of your friend. Loyalty to a friend also speaks well.’

My face reddened and he chuckled.

‘You may look at me,’ Lord Xiao said.

I saw a man in his fifties, in the prime of life, enrobed as befitted his position. His face narrow and, I thought, supercilious because watchful for disrespect. Fine lines ran in parallels across his forehead. Perhaps I stared, for he said lightly: ‘Have you looked enough, young man?’ His confidants tittered. My head ducked down.

‘Let me sample some of this poetry I hear about from your teachers. No, not the poems you’ve brought with you. Improvise something.’

There was a murmur of amusement among Lord Xiao’s followers. Here was the moment of trial. A verse in regular style at once shaped itself. I spoke hesitantly at first, then closed my eyes, possessed by words:
Outside doors taller than my father’s I wait.

Whisper of suitors. Shadows shaping.

But my Lord’s painting by Xie-He lends ease.

Sages and waterfalls blend wisdom,
Approving the virtue of Lord Xiao’s house.

I waited, breathless, as though my fate depended on those words. In a sense it did. Or one possible fate, among many. For Lord Xiao could have yawned and sent me away without further comment, having decided I was no use to him. Instead he said: ‘Interesting. So you noticed my Xie-He. Of course I own better, but that painting is certainly fine. Perhaps I should move it to a more promi-nent position. You may go now, Yun Cai. Yes, interesting.’

He had remembered my name! Without raising my eyes, I shuffled backwards, and out. Amidst elation, I felt a deep tiredness. Great men exhaust their followers; one can never be at ease with them.

P’ei Ti also gained Lord Xiao’s attention at that audience. He was not asked to improvise a verse. Instead Lord Xiao questioned my friend concerning proper ceremonial procedure at a prefectural levee. Of course, P’ei Ti had pleasingly orthodox opinions on the matter, but also dared to offer an idea of his own concerning official uniforms for Third Grade clerks. The great man nodded, as though in approval. P’ei Ti repeated this story until I knew it by heart.

How often my life has resembled the absurd entertainments popular in the Imperial Pleasure Grounds!

Certainly a bitter farce was brewing. Uncle Ming’s household made up the cast of this puppet show. But we were live puppets, with hearts to break and bodies to waste away, the strings animating us barely understood. If we did not speak our lines in the shrill nasal voices favoured by puppet-masters, it was merely because we took ourselves too seriously.

Lord Xiao sent his secretary to test my respectability one morning towards the end of summer. Only two weeks remained before the examination. The whole household stood in readiness. Every room and warehouse had been swept clean. Bright banners bearing the name of Lord Xiao hung from the eaves. Uncle Ming was determined to make a good impression, even at the expense of his wife’s good will. There was little enough of that. Honoured Aunty’s scowl lingered from the moment she appeared, lightened only by a peculiar smile when she met my eye, which vanished as soon as it began. At once my natural anxiety doubled.

Lord Xiao’s secretary was not visiting to discuss the price of hemp. His time was valuable, for it implied favour. His task no less than assessing my character through that of my family, the two being inseparable. In our case he needed to be vigilant. We were not scholar-officials of longstanding like P’ei Ti’s relatives. Uncle Ming, though wealthier than most officials, was essentially
shang
, mere merchant, worthy of small honour.

In my favour, it could be argued that Father was a Lord; but his elevation, so recent, bore a taint of vulgarity. I was walking a web of invisible threads whose strength I could not anticipate. Nothing was certain.

Uncle Ming met Secretary Wen at the gates, and ushered him with due ceremony to a room full of presents for the great man. In pride of place stood a complete rhinoceros horn, a princely gift, for it might save Lord Xiao’s life in case of severe sickness. I knelt on the floor beside Cousin Hong, who risked a wink while the secretary was examining a casket containing a bolt of sky blue silk.

Truly Uncle Ming had invested in me. Or in his love for my father, which amounted to the same thing. Indeed, I believe it was the only love he felt deeply.

‘I come in august of a greater presence,’ began the Secretary. ‘His name illuminates west and east. Millions are grateful for his wisdom.’

Uncle Ming shifted uneasily in his best robes.

‘Lord Xiao,’ he said. He seemed at a loss for words.

‘Lord Xiao is a wonder.’

I cringed inwardly. The Secretary looked at him in surprise, then frowned.

‘Of course,’ he said. ‘Such a one must not be associated with anyone base, lest his reputation suffer.’

Uncle Ming, who had no reputation to lose, unless it involved the quality of his wine, nodded wisely.

‘I must ask,’ continued the Secretary. ‘Is your nephew of unimpeachable character?’

‘Why yes,’ said Uncle. ‘He’s a hard-working boy. He has read more books than I’ve sold jars, and that’s saying something.’

If he expected the Secretary to soften, he was at once disappointed.

‘I see. Is his body sound?’

Uncle Ming glanced across at me. Then at the presents.

‘He’s as strong as a rhinoceros.’

‘No deformities?’

‘None I’ve ever seen.’

‘What of his breaths?’ continued the Secretary. ‘Are they sound?’

I awaited Uncle’s reply with trepidation. Clearly he was struggling for appropriate words.

‘They never smell anything but sweet,’ he said. ‘And he never gets short of breath.’

‘That’s not what I meant.’

Cousin Hong rose slightly and whispered in his father’s ear.

‘Oh, I see. Of course. Yes, his breaths are wholesome.

Definitely wholesome. I’d vouch for every one of them.’

He spread his hands across his heart to prove his point.

‘Hmm. That is well,’ said Secretary Wen. ‘What of hidden vices?’

‘As I say, he’s a good boy.’

‘I must tell you,’ continued the Secretary. ‘While no one doubts this particular candidate’s ability, there are questions, how can I put it, concerning the provenance of his, ahem, ancestors.’

A look of irritation crossed Uncle Ming’s plump face.

‘Honoured Secretary, let me beg a question of you.’

Our interrogator’s eyes narrowed.

‘That is not entirely regular, but please proceed.’

Uncle Ming waved to indicate the fine house in which we sat.

‘Do you know how I gained this place?’ he asked. ‘But of course you do, for you have made honest, careful enquiries concerning me. All this I earned through hiring the right men. Men who are trustworthy and know how to work. I would hire my nephew and rely on him like the morning sun.’

The Secretary waited, for Uncle was clearly approaching another point.

‘Come,’ said Uncle Ming, softly. ‘Let us take a cup.

Talking is thirsty work. While we drink, perhaps you might honour me by opening the small casket to your left.

It is an unworthy gift for yourself, Honoured Secretary.

One man to another, you understand.’

At once servants appeared with warm wine flasks and
dim sum
. The room filled with delicious scents. The Secretary opened the casket. His breath hissed involuntarily. Inside lay a bar of solid silver. A year’s salary to him.

‘Why,’ he said, slowly. ‘Why, everything seems in order.’

Uncle Ming smiled his meaningless smile.

‘I am glad you find us so,’ he said.

Beside me, Cousin Hong coughed.

We left the chamber with the same ceremony with which we’d arrived. It was outside, in the courtyard, the trouble began. Honoured Aunty watched from a doorway beneath Cousin Zhi’s bedchamber. The servants were on their knees in neat lines. Abruptly, one leapt to her feet.

We all froze in astonishment. Everything happened with agonising slowness.

Peach Blossom was the servant. Who knows what terrible threats or bribes drove her to such desperate action?

Her eyes were red with weeping and she clutched her belly. She wailed pitifully like a poorly-trained actress, and lurched forward.

‘Yun Cai!’ she cried. ‘I am with child! Oh, I am with child!’

The Secretary gaped at her in amazement.

‘What is this?’ he demanded, angrily.

Then a figure beside me was moving. Cousin Hong had the girl by the arm and was shaking her so hard her teeth rattled.

‘You whore!’ he roared. ‘Are you mad? What time is this to tell me such news!’

Then he dragged her sobbing to the house, shoved her through a door and slammed it shut. A stunned silence lay across the courtyard. To my amazement he came over and literally grovelled before his father.

‘Forgive me, Father!’ he cried, with every sign of distress. ‘My concubine. . . she is afflicted, possessed by demons.’

Uncle Ming glanced across at Honoured Aunty, who met his gaze without flinching. At once I understood. If her favourite son could not pass through the Vermilion Doors, I should not.

‘What is this?’ repeated the Secretary. ‘She used this young man’s name.’

‘It is my pet name with her,’ cried Hong, from his position on the ground.

‘I am shamed you have been inconvenienced,’ muttered Uncle Ming. ‘You have heard my son. His concubine, nothing to do with my nephew, that is for sure.’

‘Ah, I see. The girl is perhaps mad?’ offered the Secretary.

‘She’s not well in the head,’ broke in Cousin Hong.

‘I only keep her here out of charity,’ added Uncle Ming.

‘Which I regret because it has inconvenienced an Honoured Guest. Still, any act of kindness might help me in my next life.’

The Secretary examined each of our faces in turn. I could not meet his eye. At last, he shrugged. He was no fool.

Uncle Ming led him decorously to the carriage, bowing low as it drove away. Then, without a word to any of us, he swept to his office and did not emerge until late the next day.

Until that moment I had never truly understood the extent of my indebtedness to Uncle Ming. And now to Cousin Hong. For the first time I imagined the possibility of failing in the examination I took for granted; and my disgrace if I failed. A terrible realisation of folly stole the blood from my face.

‘Let’s hope Lord Xiao’s secretary liked his silver,’ said Cousin Hong, brushing dust from his clothes. ‘Otherwise you’d better start looking for a new patron.’

I never saw Peach Blossom again. Nor was the incident mentioned, except that evening when I sought out Cousin Hong to thank him.

‘You owe me for that, Little General,’ he replied. ‘And I always get repaid.’

But I did not forget. When the time came, I did not forget.

I often wondered what became of Peach Blossom. She was certainly with child. My child. Somewhere in the wide reaches of the Middle Kingdom there is a man or woman bearing my features, perhaps mourning an unknown father. Was that child’s life ruined for the sake of an hour’s pleasure? Perhaps he or she lives happily with children and grandchildren? One could speculate endlessly.

Poor Peach Blossom. I have no doubt Honoured Aunty failed to fulfil whatever bargain they struck. My shame is that I did not even seek to find out whether she was safe. She was only a servant girl. Such things happen every day.

*

At last, as with all longed-for and dreaded things, the day of the examination arrived. I was almost nineteen. Young to attempt such a rampart. Yet scale it I must, or suffer disgrace in Uncle Ming’s household and endure the gloating mockery of Honoured Aunty and Cousin Zhi. Perhaps even be forced into a lowly clerk’s position until the day I expired of boredom.

I was woken in the middle of the night, my room still dark. The servant, an old retainer of Honoured Aunty, held a lamp as I dressed in my student’s gown. I was about to take the satchel I had prepared the night before, containing ink cakes and brushes, as well as food to sustain me through the trial ahead, when the servant coughed.

‘I’d empty my bowels if I was you, young sir,’ he said.

His eyes were yellow in the lamp light.

‘Ah,’ I said. ‘Thank you.’

Then I retired behind a screen, his suggestion being easily fulfilled, such was my nervousness. Perhaps that is why I didn’t hear my satchel rustle.

‘Dawn is near,’ he said.

I was about to follow him out when my eye fell on a small, silk bag on a chest. Su Lin had given it to me on the occasion of the First Examination, four years earlier. It had brought me good fortune then, so I stuffed it in the pouch at my belt. I also placed a lucky amulet round my wrist, a present from Mother and Father on leaving Wei.