Anchee Min - The Last Empress

No one told me how my favorite died. The report, dated two weeks before I received it, was sent by Governor Ting of Shantung province and stated that An-te-hai was arrested and prosecuted for violating provincial law. In the report Ting asked for permission to discipline the eunuch, but did not mention the measures he would take.

I requested that An-te-hai be sent back to Peking for me to discipline. But Governor Ting claimed that my messenger didn't reach him in time.

There was no doubt in my mind that Governor Ting knew An-te-hai's background. Ting must have had powerful backing or he wouldn't have had the courage to challenge me.

As it turned out, all evidence pointed to three people: Prince Kung, Nuharoo and Tung Chih.

The day An-te-hai died, I gave up on Tung Chih, for I realized the depth of my son's disaffection toward me.

I was expected to forget An-te-hai. "After all, he was only a eunuch," everyone said. If I were a dog, I would have barked at Prince Kung, who sent me invitations to banquets held by foreign embassies; at Nuharoo, who pleaded with me to join her at operas; and at my son, who sent me a basket of fruit picked with his own hands in the Imperial fruit garden.

My heart was shattered, and the pieces were pickled in sadness. When I lay in bed, the darkness was impossible to penetrate. I would picture white pigeons circling my roof and An-te-hai's voice gently calling me.

During my own investigation, I tried to find evidence that would exonerate Tung Chih. When I could not deny the facts, I only hoped that my son had been manipulated by others and so was not truly culpable.

"I want to know exactly where, when and how my favorite died," I told Li Lien-ying, now An-te-hai's successor. "I want to know An-te-hai's side of the story and his last wishes."

No one was willing to come forward. "No one in the palace or the court will speak for An-te-hai, and no one is willing to serve as his witness," Li Lien-ying reported.

I sent for Yung Lu, who came as fast as he could from the northern provinces. When he entered the hall of my palace, I ran to him and almost fell on my knees.

He helped me to a chair and waited until I stopped weeping. He gently asked if I was sure that An-te-hai was blameless. I asked Yung Lu what he meant. He replied that during the voyage south An-te-hai's behavior was, if not criminal, certainly out of the ordinary.

"Why are you siding with my enemies?"

"I judge only based on facts, Your Majesty." Yung Lu stood firm. "If you want me to find out the truth, you have to be willing to accept it."

I took a deep breath and said, "I am listening."

"Forgive me, Your Majesty, but An-te-hai might not have been the person you thought you knew."

"You have no right to…" Again I began to cry. "You didn't know An-te-hai, Yung Lu! He might have been a eunuch, but he was a true man at heart. I have never known a person who loved life more than An-te-hai did. If you had known his stories, his dreams, his poems, his love of opera, his suffering, you would have understood the man."

Yung Lu looked skeptical.

"An-te-hai was an expert in court etiquette and dynastic laws," I continued. "He would never have violated them. He knew the consequences. Are you telling me that he asked to die?"

"Look at the facts, please, and then ask how they tell otherwise," Yung Lu said quietly. "An-te-hai did something he shouldn't have. I am sure you're right that he knew the consequences. In fact, he must have contemplated the result of his action before committing himself to it. This makes the case complicated. You can't deny that An-te-hai offered his enemy a chance to eliminate him." Yung Lu looked intensely at me. "Why did he make himself a target?"

I felt lost and shook my head.

Yung Lu requested permission to assemble a team of professional investigators. Within a month, a detailed report was presented to me. Besides Governor Ting, the witnesses included An-te-hai's fellow eunuchs, boatmen, shop owners, dressmakers, local artists and prostitutes.

The weather had been favorable when An-te-hai sailed down the Grand Canal. The eunuch accomplished his mission at the factories in Nanking, where the silks and brocades were woven for the upcoming Imperial wedding. An-te-hai also inspected the progress of the gowns Nuharoo and I had ordered, as well as those for Tung Chih and his new wives and concubines. An-te-hai then visited the grave of his hero, the Ming navigator Cheng Ho. I could only imagine his excitement.

I vividly remembered the moment An-te-hai came to bid me farewell. He was dressed in a splendid floor-length green satin robe with a pattern of ocean waves. He looked handsome and full of energy. I had great hope that this might be a new beginning for him.

Only a few months before, An-te-hai had gotten married. It was the talk of Peking. For the eunuch population, An-te-hai set an example of hope that they, too, might be redeemed from their status. Mentally, marriage might somehow reinstate their manhood and bring them peace. But things had not gone well.

An-te-hai moved away from the eunuchs' quarters to live with his four wives and concubines. Both he and I hoped that his new companions would lift his spirits. He could have had maidens from good families, since he was offering a fortune in dowries, but he purchased women from brothels. I suppose he thought they would share an understanding of suffering and might better accept, or at least be sympathetic to, what he couldn't provide as a husband. An-te-hai purposely avoided picking the pretty women. He looked especially for those who had survived the abuse of men. Wife number one was a twenty-six-year-old who was very ill and had been left to die in her brothel.

It was difficult to compliment An-te-hai's ladies when he brought them to me. They looked like sisters, and their facial expressions were dull. They snatched cookies from the tray and loudly slurped their tea.

A month or so after An-te-hai's wedding, he moved back to the Forbidden City. The chief eunuch made no mention of his life at home. But everyone except me seemed to know exactly what had happened. From Li Lien-ying I learned that An-te-hai's wives had failed to meet his expectations. The women were rude, loud and unreasonably demanding. They took pleasure in ridiculing his shortcomings. One of them ran away to have an affair with a previous client. When An-te-hai found out, he went after the wife and beat her almost to death.

On the day An-te-hai departed on his buying trip, his recent troubles seemed a distant memory. But still I worried for him. The journey was long, the undertaking huge.

"Be happy for me, my lady," he reassured me. "I feel like a fish going back to its home spring."

"It's a three-month trip. Maybe you can start looking again for a wife," I teased.

"A decent one this time. I'll take your advice and bring back a girl from a good family."

We parted at the port on the Grand Canal where a procession of junks waited. An-te-hai stood on one of the two large dragon barges, decorated with a flying dragon and phoenix. I was sure with such a presentation local authorities would be awestruck. They would be eager to answer An-te-hai's requests or offer their protection.

"Come back for your birthday, An-te-hai." I waved as he boarded.

My favorite one smiled. A brilliant smile. The last one.

My enemies described An-te-hai's procession as an "extravaganza." The eunuch was said to be drunk all the time. "He hired musicians and he dressed in dragon robes like an emperor," Governor Ting's report read. "Dancing to the sound of pipes and cymbals, An-te-hai received the congratulations of his retinue. His behavior was illegal and marked by folly."

The court echoed, "The law says that the punishment for any eunuch who travels outside Peking is death." They had forgotten that this was not An-te-hai's first trip. Over a decade earlier, as a sixteen-year-old, An-te-hai traveled alone from Jehol to Peking on a secret mission to reach Prince Kung. He was not punished but honored for heroism.