Pearl Buck - Peony

Yet it was hard to imagine his life without Kueilan, and only with Leah — and Peony. Ah, but Leah would never have allowed him Peony! Kueilan had been more generous, and he liked this generosity. He knew that had his mother been living at this moment, he would not have acknowledged to her his disappointment in his wife. He had married Kueilan for her pretty face and her rounded creamy flesh, for her dark eyes and her little hands, for her heart as free as a child’s from fear of God. If she had been lacking in other ways — He lifted his head suddenly and straightened his shoulders. Let him acknowledge the truth! With Peony always in his house, he had known no lack. She met his mind fully. With her he discussed his sons and his business and all his problems, and she had arranged his pleasures and his household affairs, and she had shielded him from petty cares. His life had been good.

The chanting ended, and he heard the first clods fall upon his father’s coffin. The magistrate had presented that coffin, and it was made from a huge log of cypress wood, carved and gilded. Kung Chen, standing across the grave in somber purple robes of secondary mourning, wiped his eyes. He had not wept aloud as the lesser mourners had done, and even now he was silent while the tears kept running down his cheeks. He had loved Ezra well, and that he had never trusted him wholly did not make his love less. No man was perfect, and he had been amused to discover that not even the union between their families could ensure him against Ezra’s love of money. Yet in other ways Ezra had been warmhearted. He could be tempted to cheat me himself, but at least he would never allow another to cheat me, Kung Chen thought sorrowfully, and he grieved sincerely that he would see no more the ruddy bearded face of his friend. He felt eyes upon him and he looked up and found David’s gaze fastened upon him across the grave.

David looked down again, and he thought, Kung Chen is nearest now to me as a father. He loved the good Chinese merchant, and yet the knowledge of his new nearness startled him. The last root was cut with his mother’s people. Here he was now, forever, irrevocably. The memory of old conscience stirred in him unhappily.

When at last the long funeral was over, David went home again, bearing this prick of conscience in him. It remained upon him alone to keep alive the vestiges of old faith — or let them die.

Peony had managed to reach home early, and it was her face that David first saw when he entered the gate. She perceived his relief.

“Ah, Peony, see to the household,” he murmured. “I must be alone for a while.”

“Leave all to me,” she replied steadily.

He thanked her, with a smile warm in his eyes and touching his lips, and passed her and went to his own rooms. There was enough for Peony to do with the children, and the youngest was crying loudly now for comfort. She took the child from the weary nurse and hushed him in her arms.

“Go and change your garments,” she bade the woman. “When you are in your usual ones he will not be so frightened.”

She held and coaxed him with soft words. So had she held and comforted all of David’s sons, for they were the only children she had. Each one of them recognized her for someone not quite his mother, and yet somehow stronger than his mother, a decisive voice in his life and a comfort when his mother was cross or sleeping. Peony never changed. Kueilan could love her children extravagantly and heap them with sweets and pattings and pressings of hands and smellings of their cheeks, but she could slap them, too, and scold them loudly. Peony was always gentle, never too warm and never cold. She was the rock in the foundation of their lives. The child stopped crying and she took off his outer garments and she made him dry and warm and fed him a little fresh tea from a bowl, and when the nurse returned her charge was cheerful again.

So Peony went from one to the other, and saw that each child was made happy by some small attention and at play. She kept a little store of hidden toys, trifles that she bought here and there, always new to the children, and she brought out something now for each child, to cast out the thought of death.

“Shall we never see Grandfather again?” the eldest child asked.

“His spirit is always here,” Peony replied.

“Can I see his spirit?” the child asked again.

“Not with your eyes,” Peony replied. “But in the night sometimes think of him and how he looks and then you will feel him with you. Now here is a little book I have kept for you — see if you can read it.”

Peony had been the tutor for the little boys. Now she sat down and the two eldest leaned their elbows on her knees and she opened the book and they tried to read. She took pride in their quickness and she praised them heartily and they forgot the sadness in the house. The book was one she had found on Madame Ezra’s own shelf. Long ago Peony had sorted these books and she had put some in the library and some in the box of Madame Ezra’s private possessions with the shawls and trinkets and sacred emblems that suited no one else now. But Peony had kept for herself a little book written in simple Chinese words that told the story of Madame Ezra’s people, how they had once been held slaves in Egypt, and had been set free by a favorite of the queen, who had in his veins some of the strange blood. This story David’s sons now read with wonder.

“Where is this Egypt?” one son asked.

“Why were those people slaves?” the eldest asked, and again he asked, “Who was the Moses who set them free?”

He looked very solemn when the story was finished. “But it was not kind of their god to kill all the eldest born, like me. I am glad that god is not here.”

None of the questions could Peony answer, and so she said, “It is all only a story, long ago finished.”

After she had put the book away and had seen to it that the children had their supper and were playing, she pondered these questions in her heart. Surely someone in the house should answer them, lest later, when the children were grown, they would know nothing of their ancestors, and this would be an evil. Ancestors are the roots in any house, and children are the flowers, and the two must not be cut asunder. She made up her mind that when she had time she would delve into Madame Ezra’s old books and discover for herself enough to answer the children’s questions.

Now she must go to her mistress and see that she was comfortable and in fair spirits. The twilight was falling and the air was still and mild as she crossed the courts. The house was very quiet, and she missed with some sort of heartache the two who were gone. Yet the generations passed, and now David was the head and the oldest living generation. She thought suddenly of the locked door. Indeed, she had not for one moment forgotten it. He had locked his own door against her, for the first time in their lives. What if it had been against himself? Still, it was against her. She would never go to him now. The door was locked forever — unless he himself unlocked it.

Yet she was unchanged. She must do much for him, more than ever before. Comfort and amusement were no longer enough. She must study what would add to his dignity and his growth. His life must be of fullest worth, so that he could find strength and peace in himself. She lifted her face to the sky for a moment. She had never made a prayer in her life, and she knew no god, but her heart searched Heaven and fastened upon the god of his people, whose name, she remembered, was Jehovah.

Deign to hear the voice of one unknown to You, she prayed within herself. Inform my spirit so that I may serve with wisdom the man whom I love.

She stood a moment, waiting, but no sign came. The bamboos rustled slightly in the almost silent air, and somewhere in the city a woman’s sorrowful voice called in the distance to summon home again the wandering spirit of her dying child.