Pearl Buck - Pavilion of Women

“He is no better,” Madame Kang said. Her round red face which had been beaming like a lit lantern was suddenly woeful. “I am considering whether I should take him to the foreign hospital. What do you think?”

“Is it a matter of life and death?” Madame Wu asked, considering the matter.

“It may be, within a few days,” Madame Kang replied. “But they say that the foreign doctor does not know how to tell what a sickness is without cutting people open to see. And Little Happiness is so small — only five, you know, Sister. I think his life is still too tender for him to be cut open.”

“At least wait until tomorrow,” Madame Wu said. “Let us not spoil today.” Then, fearing lest she were selfish, she added, “Meanwhile I will send Ying with a bowl of broth made after an old recipe of my great-grandmother for just such a cough as he has. I have used it often on my first and third sons and more than once on their father. You know he has been troubled with a cough for the last two winters.”

“Ailien, you are always kind,” Madame Kang said gratefully. It was early and the garden was cool but she took a small fan from her sleeve and began to use it, laughing while she did so. “I am hot as soon as the snow is gone,” she said.

They sat for a moment in silence. Madame Kang looked at her friend lovingly and without jealousy. “Ailien, I did not know what to bring you for a birthday gift. So I brought you this—”

She reached into the loose bosom of her wide blue satin robe and brought out a little box. This she handed to her friend.

Madame Wu recognized the box as she took it. “Ah, Meichen, do you really want to give me your pearls?”

“Yes, I do.” Across Madame Kang’s plain good face a flicker passed as of pain.

“Why?” Madame Wu asked, perceiving it.

Madame Kang hesitated, but only for a moment. “The last time I wore them, my sons’ father said they looked like dewdrops on a melon.” Madame Kang smiled. Then tears came to her eyes. She paid no heed to them, and they rolled slowly down her cheeks and splashed on the thick satin over her bosom without penetrating it.

Madame Wu saw them without appearing to do so. She did not move in her chair. In her hands she held the box of pearls. She had often let Madame Kang talk of her difficulties with Mr. Kang. Neither of them had ever talked of Mr. Wu, beyond a word or two put in by Madame Kang.

“Ah, Ailien,” she would say, “your sons’ father is so little trouble to you. So far I have never heard of his even entering a house of flowers. But my man — well, he is good, too. Yes, only—”

At this point Madame Kang always paused and sighed.

“Meichen,” Madame Wu had once said many years ago, “why not allow him to enjoy himself so long as he always comes home before morning?” She had never forgotten the look of shame that came into her friend’s honest eyes. “I am jealous,” Madame Kang had declared. “I am so jealous that my blood turns to fire.”

Madame Wu, who had never known what jealousy was, became silent. This was something in her friend which she could not understand. She could understand it less when she remembered Mr. Kang, who was an ordinary wealthy merchant and not even handsome. He was shrewd but not intelligent. She could not imagine any pleasure in being married to him.

“I have been wanting for a long time to tell you something,” she said now after a moment. “At first, when I began thinking about it I thought I would ask your advice. But — I have not. Now I think it is beyond advice. It has already become certainty.”

Madame Kang sat waiting while she fanned herself. The slight breeze from the fan dried her tears. She wept and laughed easily out of the very excess of her goodness. In this friendship she knew humbly that she took the second place. It was not only that she was not beautiful, but in her own mind she did nothing so well as Madame Wu. Thus with all her efforts her house, though as large and as handsome as this one, was seldom clean and never ordered. In spite of her every endeavor, the servants took charge of it, and convenience rather than good manners had become the habit. When she came here she felt this, although living in her house she did not see it. But she often told herself that anyone who came into Madame Wu’s presence grew better for it, and this was perhaps the chief reason why she continued to come ten times to this house to Madame Wu’s one visit to her own house.

“Whatever you want to tell me,” she now said.

Madame Wu lifted her eyes. They were long and large, and the black irises were very distinct against the white, and this gave them their look of ageless youth. She spoke with cool clarity. “Ailien, I have decided that today I shall ask my sons’ father to take a concubine.”

Madame Kang’s round mouth dropped ajar. Her white small teeth, which were her one beauty, showed between her full lips. “Has — he — has he, too—” she gasped.

“He has not,” Madame Wu said. “No, it is nothing like that. Of course, I have never asked what he does at his men’s feasts. That has nothing to do with me or our home. No, it is only for his own sake — and mine.”

“But how — for you?” Madame Kang asked. She felt at this moment suddenly superior in her own relationship to Mr. Kang. Such a step would never have occurred to her, nor, she was sure, to him. A concubine always in the house, a member of the family, her children fighting with the other children, she contending with the first wife for the man — all this would be worse than flower houses.

“I wish for it,” Madame Wu said. She was gazing now into the depths of the clear little pool. The orchids she had plucked an hour ago lay on her knee, still fresh. So quiet was she that in her presence flowers lived many hours without fading.

“But will he consent?” Madame Kang asked gravely. “He has always loved you.”

“He will not consent at first,” Madame Wu said tranquilly.

Now that she had received this news, Madame Kang was full of questions. They poured out of her, and the fan dropped from her hand. “But will you choose the girl — or he? And, Ailien, if she has children, can you bear it? Oh, me, is there not always trouble in a house where two women are under one man’s roof?”

“I cannot complain of it if at my wish he takes her,” Madame Wu said.

“Ailien, you would not compel him?” Madame Kang asked with pleading.

“I have never compelled him to do anything,” Madame Wu replied.

Someone coughed, and both ladies looked up. Ying stood in the doorway. On her round cheerful face was a mischievous look which Madame Wu at once recognized.

“Do not tell me that on this day of all days Little Sister Hsia is here!” she exclaimed. Her lovely voice was tinged with rueful mirth.

“It is she,” Ying said. She stopped to laugh and then covered her mouth with her hand. “Oh, heaven, she will hear me,” she whispered. “But Lady, I swear she does not understand a no. I told her you were having guests—”

“Not that it was my birthday!” Madame Wu exclaimed. “I do not want to have to invite her.”

“I am not so stupid as that,” Ying replied. “But I told her that Madame Kang was here.”

“I am going,” Madame Kang said with haste. “I have no time to listen to foreign gospel today. Indeed, Ailien, I came here when I should have been directing the affairs of the house, only to give you my gift.”

But Madame Wu put out her slender hand. “Meichen, you may not go. You must sit here with me, and together we will be kind to her and listen to her. If she does not leave at the end of a half an hour, then you may rise and say farewell.”

Madame Kang yielded, as she always did, being unable to refuse anything to one she loved. She sat down again in great good nature, and Ying went away and came back bringing with her a foreigner, a woman.