The Silver Lotus (42 page)

The young count was as good as his word, and he returned Macy to her mother after the supper. He regretted that Lady Yee had not joined them, and requested the company of both mother and daughter at a more intimate supper the following week. Lady Yee was pleased to accept, and without further comment sent Macy off to dance with her Russian count.

Lady Yee had no need to ask Macy whether she was enjoying herself, or if she found the handsome young count to her liking. Her daughter's sentiments on both subjects were reflected in the glow of her complexion, the grace of her movements, and the childlike sparkle in her eyes. When Macy was ready, she would tell her mother all about it. She always did.

Lady Yee spent the rest of the evening being introduced to various notables by Mr. Bishop. One introduction in particular was quite a surprise. An elder member of the Russian commercial legation introduced himself as Dmitri Ermolov. He was head of the trade delegation,
and had known Lady Yee's father, Master Yee, when he was posted to Canton. At the time he had been in charge of the Russian fur and amber trade, and bartered ermine and mink pelts for jade and Canton silk, and Baltic amber for fine bone porcelain and other artistic luxuries. The old Russian and Lady Yee talked for quite some time about Canton and the China trade, a subject about which she knew a great deal more than Mr. Ermolov, as it turned out. However, it was from this lovely gentleman that Lady Yee discovered everything she really wanted to know about the young man who was paying court to her daughter.

Lady Yee knew that the young count would eventually have to stand up to Macy's father as a primary pattern of male prominence and grace, and that would not be easy. It was only natural that a girl would judge all other men by the standards of her father, good or bad, but in Captain Hammond's case that would represent a very long benchmark indeed. But there was a contextual problem. Lady Yee's predilection toward prognostication was now functioning in an analytical mode only, and though she secretly believed she might be addressing her future son-in-law, she also knew that Macy was a unique element, and one whose coefficients were sometimes highly unpredictable. Just when it looked like she might tack with the wind and steer the common course, she would suddenly come about and race off on her own, showing her heels to one and all as she charged past in the opposite direction. Nonetheless, Lady Yee knew her daughter well enough to believe that those instances were never the result of a fickle or childish temperament, or simply fits of contrary pique, but rather a sincere conviction that her safest and surest course was guided by a different star, and for Macy that guiding beam sometimes appeared in a different quadrant of the sky altogether. In point of fact, Macy's unique thought process and oblique train of logic were very much like her mother's, which must have come as something of a shock to Lady Yee when she finally figured it out.

Lady Yee smiled as she recalled that her own adoring and indulgent father Master Yee often said it would have been far easier to raise a platoon of boisterous and disobedient sons than another daughter like the Silver Lotus. He complained that nothing about her was in the least predictable. But he smiled knowingly when he at last met his new granddaughter, for he knew at once that Lady Yee would soon come to experience the same riveting confusion and consternation he had enjoyed as a parent of three intelligent, headstrong daughters. He saw it, as most elders do, as the inevitable balance of karma, and it had amused him to ponder the outcome.

Though she tried to keep an open mind to all the possibilities, Lady Yee was not quite prepared for Macy's undeniable attraction to the handsome young Russian who labored so hard to please. She could see the excited expression of romantic expectation in her daughter's eyes, and she was reminded of the first time she had met and talked with Captain Hammond. But of course, Captain Hammond was taller and far more attractive than the Russian count, at least to her way of thinking, but that was to be expected. The captain had been a yard-larking Yankee seaman of the old school, who towered over most men by more than a foot. His great mane of bronze-colored hair made him look even larger, and certainly more imposing. But in the main, none of that really mattered, because even Lady Yee had to admit that the dashing Count Henri Pavel Volkofsky possessed the most beautifully clear aquamarine-blue eyes she had ever seen. The honesty of his expression compounded with the liquid innocence of his eyes had the hypnotic lure of moral transparency.

 

 

 

THE DAY AFTER THE BALL, Count Volkofsky sent Lady Yee and her daughter a handwritten invitation to take dinner that night aboard a visiting imperial Russian cruiser docked in San Francisco Bay. If they
could kindly see their way to accept the invitation, the count promised to provide the most comfortable transport possible. They were to be the honored guests of Admiral Prince Vesili Chekovich.

Every other day the count sent baskets of flowers and exotic fruits, as well as invitations to one fashionable event or another. With a natural gate of chivalry that Lady Yee found sincere and endearing, the attentive young count hosted mother and daughter at numerous theater parties, opera dinners, elite horse races, and elaborately fashionable picnics laid out under colorful canvas kiosks and broad awnings set up in private garden parks overlooking the bay. Lady Yee could easily see where matters stood, and though the count had said nothing formally on the subject of courtship, he seemed to be accomplishing his ends very well.

Macy, on the other hand, needed no boyish professions of romantic intent, because she knew instinctually that she was at the reins of the whole business, or at least that's what she believed at the time. Lady Yee knew better, however, and privately decided it was time to reel in some slack and see just how tenacious the count could be when snagged on a short line.

Without telling Macy beforehand, Lady Yee arranged to accept an invitation from Mr. Bishop to enjoy a steamboat excursion up the American River to the state capital, to attend a celebratory ball favoring the recent election of the new governor. They would be gone for ten days, and though she made no secret of their destination and intentions to the hotel management, she believed no purpose could be served by informing Count Volkofsky of their plans. He would have to discover those for himself, and then judge what to do with the information. It was just one of the hoops that Lady Yee had planned to test the dedication, endurance, and flexibility of her daughter's suitor.

As matters progressed, Lady Yee discovered that she might just as well have saved all the effort, for on the night of the governor's ball, Lady Yee and her daughter were greeted at the door by the Russian
counsel general, Prince Magoyan, and the dashing young Count Volkofsky. Lady Yee was totally surprised to discover that the count was the person who had arranged for the Hammonds to be invited in the first place.

It appeared that Count Volkofsky had the will and the way to achieve his purposes, even to the extent of using his position to manipulate the offices of the governor of California. Romantically speaking, he was fearless, and even confessed to Lady Yee that no effort or expense of time or fortune was too extravagant if it helped convince Miss Hammond of the sincerity and enthusiasm of his sentiments. Miss Hammond, on the other hand, was in the throes of her own emotional gallop through the woods, ducking every contrary limb and circumventing every negative obstacle that appeared in her path. By the end of the evening, Lady Yee was securely aware that her daughter had fallen deeply in love with the handsome Count Volkofsky, and she had it on the viable authority of the aging and slightly inebriated Prince Magoyan that the young count was totally besotted by the beautiful Miss Hammond.

Upon hearing this, Lady Yee chose the better part of discretion over the fruitless gestures of maternal valor and sat back to watch love's labors sail on as they might. Her father had not been able to effect the least influence on her own choice of a husband, her beloved Yankee captain. She thought it only proper that she allow her courageous daughter the same sweeping horizon that she had once expected for herself.

24

THREE MONTHS LATER, Macy Yee Hammond was married to Count Henri Pavel Volkofsky in an elaborate Russian Orthodox wedding ceremony that was in part sponsored by the Russian legation as a sign of Russian-American compatibility. Macy, whose own spiritual philosophy was decidedly but unobtrusively Chinese, was philosophically pragmatic in the extreme. She happily converted to the Russian Orthodox faith to accommodate her purpose, but did so only when the count swore she would never be forced to practice any ritual she found incompatible with her own philosophy. He confessed that he was hardly a paragon in religious matters, and only went to church for weddings and funerals. He said that he had traveled too far, and seen far too much of the world, to be remotely impressed by the functions of either politics or religion, which, as far as he was concerned, represented the same beast wearing different hides to beguile the gullible.

After the wedding, the bride and groom escorted Lady Yee back to Monterey, where for ten days Henri was treated to the very finest meals Ah Chu's genius could create. The new family spent leisurely hours getting to know one another, and in the evenings Lady Yee held her new son-in-law enthralled with tales of her adventurous life at sea with her dashing Yankee husband, Captain Jeremiah Hammond. She
took time to apprise Henri of the intricate family connections that still bound her daughter to very important people in southern China, clan associations with whom Hammond, Macy & Yee were presently doing very profitable business. She jokingly chided the young man by warning him that it was one thing to pass muster with her in America, but his biggest social hurdle would come when he was presented for inspection among the notables of Canton, where Macy had always been a particular favorite.

Before the couple departed, Lady Yee held a small reception for their Monterey friends and associates. It lasted quite informally for three days, and Ah Chu saw to it that the sideboards creaked under the weight of exotic and tasty things to eat and drink. The Neruda family and their professional associates from the infirmary were the first to pay their respects, and they all arrived bearing gifts. In all these simple gatherings, Lady Yee made a point of introducing her son-in-law as Henri Pavel Volkofsky. As an aside, she informed her darling Henri that most people living in California had migrated far to relieve themselves from the burdens of royal entitlements and prerogatives. Words like “baron,” “prince,” “count,” or even “marquis” made Americans either frightened or envious. Both extremes were distasteful since they inhibited social honesty. She suggested, with an inscrutable smile, it might be best to be known and admired first, and titled later. Volkofsky enthusiastically agreed, and Macy loved him all the more for it. Soon it was known all over town that Macy Hammond had married a devilishly handsome young Russian named Henri Pavel Volkofsky. And as luck would have it, the groom had money, which was every mother's dream come true. Lady Yee's Chinese friends were of course most especially pleased with that last all-important sign of joss.

Two days later, Henri and Macy departed by train for Oakland, where they would be reunited with their luggage and then taken aboard two luxuriously appointed railroad salon cars for a journey to New York,
from where they would sail to Europe in the grandest accommodations afforded by the White Star Line, and then proceed upon the leisurely and extensive cultural tour that Henri had promised Macy as a wedding present. Henri even promised to take her back to Canton to visit her relatives if she so desired. The whole idea of facing a battalion of Yees so unnerved him that he requested a letter of personal recommendation from his mother-in-law. Lady Yee laughed and said that document had already been sent many weeks before, and so far she'd not heard one word of protest.

Lady Yee did not accompany her daughter and son-in-law to the departing train, and she showed no inappropriate emotion when they left. In fact, she immediately changed her clothes and accompanied Dr. Neruda on an inspection tour of the infirmary, which had grown somewhat since her departure to San Francisco. She spent hours each day confirming that her gardens and orchards were properly cared for, and her evenings were spent answering or initiating long-delayed correspondence. In short, life became rather quiet after Macy's departure, but that hardly made it uneventful, since the captain had long since failed to have an influence on Lady Yee's endeavors at certain improvements in the conduct of affairs, both personal and public. And she exchanged long, illuminating letters with her daughter as Macy traveled about the world with her husband.

Time passed quite agreeably for Lady Yee. She had no feelings of solitude or loneliness because she was always involving herself in any number of rewarding civic endeavors or working with Mr. Bishop to increase the flow of business. She wrote numerous letters to those she was pleased to refer to as her committee of correspondence, and in return received, through rather clandestine channels, private and pertinent news from everywhere one could imagine. It was Mr. Bishop's contention that Lady Yee knew more about what was happening in California and most of Asia than anyone in the Americas.

FOR THOSE FEW PEOPLE whose business concerned such things, it was an uncontested truth that the venerable Lady Yee was one of the most interesting people in Monterey County. The reason this fact was generally unknown to most citizens was the result of a concerted effort on the part of Lady Yee herself. She worked diligently to make sure that her name was never remotely connected to any philanthropic or civic endeavor in which she took a financial interest.

Those fortunate people who could claim to know the regal Lady Yee moderately well always thought it truly remarkable that anything she wished to come to pass always did, and sometimes in the most mysterious or coincidental manner. Though none would dare to ask, Lady Yee never voiced even the slightest explanation as to how these marvels came to be. It was as though her abiding confidence was always enough to manifest the result she wished.