Renditions
No. 4 (Spring 1975)
By Ling Shu-hua
Translated by Marie Chan
WITH HER HEAD bent down, Missy was embroidering a cushion. The weather was swelteringly hot. Even the little Pekingnese dog could do no more than stretch under the table and pant with tongue hanging out. Flies buzzed dizzily around the window. Chang-ma stood behind the young mistress waving a fan, her face streaked with rivulets of sweat. Time and again she would wipe her face with a handkerchief but it never stayed dry; as soon as she had wiped her nose, drops would show around her mouth. She noticed that even though her young mistress was not perspiring quite as badly, her face was also flushed and scarlet. Her white shirt of fine linen was soaked through at the back. Chang-ma could not help saying:
"Missy, do take a rest and cool off. I know that Master said the cushions must be delivered tomorrow but he didn't say morning or afternoon."
"He said they must be delivered before noon tomorrow. I have to hurry. Come over here and fan me." She bent down and resumed sewing.
Chang-ma walked to the left. As she fannedc she looked at the embroidered article and uttered oohs and ahs of praise:
"I always thought those tales of young ladies who are beautiful as well as smart and clever were just made up by storytellers. I never knew there are such people. Oh, what a fme young lady we have here—fresh as the spring onion and such a hand at needlework! This bird is so neat."
For a fraction of a second a dimpled smile flickered across Missy's face. The loquacious Chang-ma spoke again:
"Well, when this pair of cushions is presented to Minister Pai and admired by everybody, I wouldn't like to say how many matchmakers will be here; they'll likely batter down our doors, trying to squeeze in. … I hear that Minister Pai's second son is an eligible young man of twenty or so. I can see Master's plan. Remember the fortune-teller told Madam last time that the lucky star is shining in your horoscope this year?"
"Stop this chatter, Chang-ma," Missy paused in her sewing to cut her short. Her cheeks flushed.
The room became very quiet; there was only the rustle of the needle as it threads through the satin and the faint swish of the wind. Suddenly the call of a teenage girl is heard outside the bamboo curtain:
"Ma, I'm here."
"Is that you, Syau-nyou? What are you doing here on a hot day like this?" Chang-ma asked nervously. Syau-nyou, in dark blue trousers and blouse, her head covered with beads of sweat and her pwnpkin-shaped face scarlet from the heat, had already slipped in through the curtain and now stood by the door, gawking at Missy.
"Ma, Auntie told us yesterday that Missy has spent half a year on a pair of cushions," the girl said breathlessly. "She said that there are thirty or forty different threads on the bird alone. I just can't believe there are that many colors. Auntie said, 'Hurry and see for yourself if you don't believe me. In a day or two they'll be sent away as a gift.' So as soon as I finished my meal I came to town. Ma, may I come over and take a look?"
Chang-ma chuckled apologetically when her daughter had finished.
"Missy, is it all right for Syau-nyou to take a look at your work?"
Missy lifted her head and looked at Syau-nyou. Her clothes were quite fIlthy; she was wiping her face with a grey handkerchief. Her gaping mouth revealed two rows of large, yellow teeth; she was staring in wide-eyed curiosity. Unconsciously Missy frowned:
"Tell her to go now; we'll see about it later."
Chang-ma sensed that Missy objected to her daughter's unkempt- ness and did not wish her to look. She quickly turned to Syau-nyou and said, "Just look at the sweat on your nose. Go and wipe your face. There's water in my room. Don't let your foul sweat annoy Missy on a hot day like this."
Syau-nyou's face fell in disappointment. She did not want to budge even after her mother had told her to go. Noticing her unwillingness, Chang-ma felt sorry but nevertheless gave her a stare:
"Go and wash your face in my room. I'll be with you right away."
With a pout, Syau-nyou lifted the curtain and left. As she changed a thread, Missy raised her head and looked out. She saw Syau-nyou wiping her forehead with her lapel. The lapel was almost soaked through. The pots of pomegranate plants in the garden spouted blood red flowers which blazed in the sun. It made her feel even hotter. She lowered her head and noticed that two wet patches had formed at her own armpits.
IN A FLASH two years had passed. Missy was still plying her needle in her secluded boudoir. Syau-nyou had grown to be as big and tall as her mother. She had learnt to keep herself tidy, and on her mother's day off she could even fill in as a housemaid.
One summer evening, Syau-nyou was sitting by the light, sewing, a pair of pillow-ends when she heard Missy calling her. Putting down her needle and thread, she hurried to Missy's room. As she was massaging Missy's legs, she chattered away intermittently:
"Missy, the day before yesterday, Godmother gave me a pair of beautiful pillow-ends. It's a kingfisher on one side and a phoenix on the other."
"Don't tell me the bird is half-and-half," Missy seemed to be scoffing at her.
"Well, there's a long story behind these pillow ends of mine. I got quite mad with Godsister because of them. They were originally given to Godmother by Wang Erh-sao. She said they were cut from two soiled cushions. They were really beautiful when they were new. One was embroidered with a lotus and a kingfisher. The other was a phoenix, perched on a rock. They were given to her master, as presents, and on the day they arrived they were placed on the chairs in the drawing room. But the same evening a drunken guest vomited on one cushion, leaving a dirty patch. The other one was pushed to the floor by one of the card players and was used by someone as a footstool. The fme satin was covered with muddy footprints. The young master of the house told Wang Erh-sao to take them away. So Godmother got them from her and gave them to me. The night I brought them back I admired them for ever so long; they are too lovely. The phoenix tail alone is made up of forty different kinds of thread. The kingfisher's eyes turned towards the little fishes in the pond seem to be alive. They sparkle—I don't know what kind of thread it is."
Missy's heart gave a little jump when she heard this. Syau-nyou went on:
"What a shame to spoil pretty things like these. Godmother saw me a couple of days ago and told me to cut off the dirty part and make pillow-ends with them. Would you believe Godsister could be so small? She said I always wheedle nice things out of Godmother ." Missy did not pay any attention to the story of their bickerings. She only recalled that in the intense heat of those dog days two years back, she had embroidered a pair of exquisite cushion covers—covers which also had a kingfisher and a phoenix on them. She remembered it was so hot she couldn't hold a needle in the daytime, and often she had to wait until nightfall to begin work. When she finished the covers she suffered from an eye ailment for more than ten days. She wanted to see how these cushions compared with hers and told Syau-nyou to go and fetch them.
Syau-nyou said when she returned with the two pieces:
"Missy, look how this beautiful piece of ebony satin is soiled. I heard that the birds were embossed before; they've caved in now. Just look at the bird's crest and the red beak! The colors are brilliant even now. Wang Erh-sao said that the kingfisher's eyeballs were once two real pearls. The lotus isn't any good now; it's turned grey. The lotus leaves are much too large; they're no use for pillow-ends. … Look, there's even a flower beside the rock. …" Missy stared blankly at the two pieces of embroidery. She could not hear Syau-nyou's last words. She could only recall that she had to undo the bird's crest three times in all; once because her sweat had stained the delicate yellow and she had discovered it only after it was completed; once because she had matched the wrong malachite thread under the night light; and the last time—she could not even remember why. The soft pink of the lotus she had hardly dared touch even after washing her hands; she would put talcum powder on her hands first. She had sewed and resewed it. … those large: lotus leaves were even more difficult. They would not have been lifelike if done in one color throughout; she had matched threads of twelve different shades of green in all. And when she flnished the cushions and presented them to the Pai family, friends and relatives had voiced numerous words of flattery; in her boudoir her own friends had made her the butt of their jokes. She had smiled shyly and blushingly when she heard them; at night she had dreamt how she would be coy and arch, how she would be dressed in clothes that she had never worn before, how many envious maidens would follow her and the faces of her friends would reveal their jealousy. That was a dream world, she realized not long after; and so she never wanted to recall it or let it disturb her thoughts. But today she saw the embroidery again, and one by one the memories returned.
Syau-nyou noticed how quiet she had become, her eyes riveted upon the pillow-ends. She said:
"You like them too, don't you, Missy? Such workmanship; they are so neat. Why don't you make a pair like this sometime?"
Missy did not hear Syau-nyou's question. She just shook her head in reply.
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Research Centre for Translation, The Chinese University of Hong Kong.