CHAPTER XXVII
Into her own room the noise of the feasters could not penetrate. The red candles burned with a steady gleam.
"I think I shall take this room when you are gone," said Kuei-lien; "it is quieter than mine."
There was a light tap on the door.
"I must leave you now," announced the concubine, in the same teasing voice; "it is time for you to weep. You must weep, you know. All brides are supposed to weep. Your ancestors will be angry if they see you showing no signs of sadness at leaving them. We shall all measure your affection for us by the noise you make. Your father will be listening with a watch in his hand. But, however much you wail, don't spoil your dress. I shall be back soon to undress you so that it will be fresh for the morning."
The tap on the door was repeated. Kuei-lien stepped gingerly round the red carpet and went softly out of the room. To her surprise she found the t'ai-t'ai waiting outside. Despite the dim light she could see deep agitation in the woman's face; she followed without any sound into her own room. The t'ai-t'ai looked to make sure the door was fastened; her attention was strained as though she suspected the walls of bending down to catch her words.
"The Great Man is dead," she said in a voice almost too low for Kuei-lien to hear.
"What!" exclaimed the girl. "Dead? It can't be. It is not true. How can he be dead? We have only just come from his room."
"I found him dead. He was lying with his head across his desk."
Kuei-lien considered the sentence for a moment.
"Yes, so he was," she admitted.
"I could not move him," went on the t'ai-t'ai. "His life must have gone out like that." She clicked her tongue. "I knew he was dead when I touched him. Ah, what a time to die, what a time to die!"
This last exclamation brought back to Kuei-lien the needs of the moment. The possibilities of her own future were too immense to be considered now; they were like disordered fragments strewn across the floor of her brain, baffling her as to how to begin sorting them, and so there was respite from her own peril diverting her thoughts to the problem of Nancy's wedding. That at least was less disturbing than the prospect of what might happen to her.
"Well, I suppose this must postpone the marriage," she said, trying to see what was in the mind of her mistress; "at least it delays it for the hundred days, doesn't it?"
"But we can't postpone the marriage," moaned the woman; "the money hasn't been paid."
"The money hasn't been paid?" asked Kuei-lien incredulously. "But we shall have no face at all if we go on with a wedding when the master is dead in the house. That would be impossible. We are not coolies. What would men say?"
"We must go on with it," persisted the t'ai-t'ai. Then she grew more secretive. "No one knows he is dead, unless it be Nancy. He must have died while she was there. What was she doing when you went in?"
"Just standing there, looking at her feet."
"You were outside all the time?"
"Yes."
"What did you hear? Did the girl do anything or say anything?"
"She did nothing, I am sure of that. She just stood, waiting for him to speak. She might have stood all night; she's like that. She didn't know he never would speak again. Finally I grew tired and pushed the door open. And there he was, with his head on the table"—Kuei-lien could not help shivering at the memory—"and she was staring at the floor. I couldn't see any more use in her doing that—ai, it was more useless than I thought! I took her hand and brought her out again."
"Then she can't have guessed that he was dead," exclaimed the t'ai-t'ai with a gasp of relief. "She surely would have cried out. She can't have guessed, she certainly can't have guessed. You must go back to her and see that she doesn't get some crazy impulse, some crazy notion of running back to her father's room to say good-bye. I am never sure of what she may do next. It is never safe to trust her. If she doesn't know, then we are all right. What good would it do to tell her now? She will learn quickly enough."
"Yes, she will—poor child," Kuei-lien said.
"It's no use telling anyone till she's safely away in her chair. I have locked his door. What time does she go?"
"At seven; the chair will be here about six."
"Good. It's only for a night. After she's gone it won't matter if we find out that the Great Man is dead. It will be too late to stop the wedding. But it mustn't be known to-night. That would just make matters difficult for all of us and wouldn't do him any good. Aren't we carrying out his own wishes? And who knows what that girl might do if we postponed the wedding? With her father gone, there's not a soul in the house can control that stubborn will of hers. You go back to her and I'll see that he isn't disturbed."
"They would have to make a lot of noise to disturb him now," Kuei-lien said.
She found Nancy sitting stiffly, gazing with dry eyes at the candles.
"Haven't you wept?" she asked, with a gesture of playful reproof. "Ah, but never mind, Nancy, you will weep!"
The bride still persisted in silence.
"Come, Nancy," Kuei-lien urged, "you must talk; you must say something. I haven't heard you say a word to-day. What are you thinking about?"
"I am not thinking," answered Nancy.
"What a perfect nun you would make," laughed the concubine. "I wish I could stop thinking. But it's no use, my dear, practising these nunnery manners for the bridal bed. And even if you don't want to think, you ought to talk. There is nothing better than talk when your heart is in pain. Lots of talk, never mind what it's about, as long as it keeps your mind from thinking. I have had to talk for years, Nancy. I have had to make myself talk. You will too. You are only just beginning to know what life is."
Kuei-lien was treating herself richly to her own medicine. In the last few weeks her manner toward Nancy had been growing increasingly kinder till she found herself bearing Nancy's pain with her own. To-night, in this still room, the secret that lay between herself and the girl she was tending overpowered her veins with a surging pity so that she chattered desperately to hold back the recurring treacherous need to break down and weep.
With an understanding gentleness she removed one by one Nancy's brilliant garments while the girl submitted as obediently as a child. Nancy's splendor slipped from her like autumn leaves blown down by a wind, leaving her white and solitary and helpless.
"You are beautiful, Nancy," said Kuei-lien, unconsciously echoing Elizabeth's tribute of long ago. Yet she could not resist teasing the girl.
"Your husband will have to do this for you to-morrow night. They will make him drunk, I expect, to give him courage. But his hands won't be so gentle as mine. Yes, Nancy, you will miss even me."
Her sympathy, however, would not let her prod the wound she had made. Kuei-lien's heart was sad, for Nancy's sake and her own. She began humming a little song as she worked:—
"Leaves like scarlet rain in the air,
Leaves like scarlet dew on the ground,
Wheeling to the earth with no sound,
Leaving high branches gray and bare."
She took off Nancy's gay slippers with the whimsical thought that her hands were the destroying wind. But her tongue could not cease humming:—
"Yellow leaves strew down golden snow,
Yellow leaves golden on the ground,
Making hearts forlorn with their sound,
Naked branches cold when they go."
"What shall I do when I don't have you to sing to, Nancy?" she asked, as she took off the bright bangles from the arms of the bride.
"You will have my father to sing to," Nancy answered.
"Yes, I shall have your father to sing to."
Kuei-lien almost wept. She tried hurriedly to hide her confusion in more words of her song:—
"Swift the summer sun in his day,
Swift the autumn moon in her night,
Slow the winter frost with its blight,
Trampling golden leaves from its way."
She stood up to lift off Nancy's headdress of pearls. Then she put them on again, and stood back to admire their sinuous lustre against the dark hair of the girl.
"Ah, a bride can never be so beautiful to another as she is beautiful to herself," she sighed.
And yet, she thought, these jewels were the last sight Timothy Herrick had seen on earth. No wonder he covered his eyes so that he might take their loveliness with him into the grave. She covered her own eyes to keep back the tears.
"Gold youth, scarlet love, each must fade,
Moon and stars cease shining in the night,
Winter snows shall long glimmer white,
Scarlet leaves and gold low are laid."
She went softly to the girl and lifted off the pearls like a crown.
"And now," she said, "you must sleep."