"Why not? 'Tis no small honor to be the handmaid of the Son of Heaven, the greatest king upon earth. Find yourself a son, and let the girl go."
"I do not wish to part with her, not just yet," the Viceroy said slowly.
"She will go away sooner or later to the household of her husband," the governor-general told him. "After all it is the same thing, for in either case she is lost to you. It is only a son who is a joy forever."
"True! True!" cried a dozen voices. "What matters a girl?"
"I will consider the question, my friends," the Viceroy said. "She is indeed beautiful and wise and good—my dearest treasure—and a fitting recompense for any honor. She is worthy the acceptance of the greatest of monarchs."
So saying he turned again to the stage and listened to the lamentations of the grief-stricken Emperor, and the fate of Tuen was not further discussed that night.
But Wo Ting remarked in a low tone to his neighbor:
"I should very much like to see that girl. It is whispered that he bought her for a slave, but that she turned out to be so uncommonly wise that he found a teacher for her, and she has been learning to read. After he found what a wonder she was, since she was also pretty, he adopted her. He is a very rich man, and doubtless he would provide well for her if he gave her in marriage. I have a son about her age, and I had been thinking of sending one of the match-makers to arrange matters with him, and get her for my son. But of course if she goes to the Emperor that settles it. If he does not send her—and I think he is loath to start her on such a long journey—I may decide to take her for my daughter-in-law. It wouldn't be a bad plan," and he scratched his chin reflectively.
But Tuen was sweetly sleeping, and dreaming of the day when she would be a wise woman who could read, and she did not know that her fate hung in the balance. And even if she had known she would have been powerless to change it.