Scarring Jasmine-Chapter Thirty Obsession

10/07/2024 Monday 56-75F Mostly Sunny

“Good morning father.” Bojun bowed to Qian while he and Jasmine were standing by the railings, watching the servants picking lotus seeds in the pond.

“Bojun, you are back! How was your trip in Shanghai?” Qian asked. 

“It was good, father. I brought a copy of the account book with me, and am planning to organize everything tonight so I can show you the details tomorrow morning in the office. Generally, last year Mr. Wu’s turnover dropped by fifteen percent, so it showed a slight deficit. He explained that the shrinkage was caused by the battle last January. However, according to the trend of his business in the past two quarters of this year, at the end of this December, he should be able to make about thirty five percent margin. Then the average annual profit will be no less than twenty five percent over the last four years.” 

“Very well.” Qian praised, “This is your Third Mother; you were busy, so I didn’t ask you to come and meet her.” 

Bojun bowed to Jasmine as well, “Third Mother, how do you do?” Jasmine responded to him with a smile. 

“Did you see your mother?” Qian asked. 

“Not yet father. I am going to see her after I finish my report to you.” 

“Ok, you can go now, tell her that this evening we will dine together, including your Second Mother and Third Mother, as well as your brother. I haven’t seen him for more than ten days!” 

“Yes father.” Bojun obeyed.

However, Qian’s younger son Zhongyou didn’t show up at that day’s dinner—He went out that afternoon and didn’t come back until midnight.

Next day in early afternoon, Zhongyou snuck into Qian’s study. Qian wasn’t there, so he sat on a chair and looked around.

This was his first time to come to his father’s new study. The old one, where Jasmine was living, was right behind this one on the other side of the lotus pond. He had heard the servants talking about his father’s new concubine, but he wasn’t interested. “Father is over fifty; it is crazy for him to marry such a young woman. Mother told me that she was only one year older than me! I have never thought that my father was a lecher!”

Zhongyou felt a little annoyed. Qian always blamed him for playing around with women, but in fact he himself did the same thing. The Second Mother was a courtesan; the Third Mother was at his own age; how could he call her “mother”? He wasn’t like his elder brother, who followed Father’s instructions blindly. “He is Father’s puppet.” Zhongyou flipped one coin on Qian’s writing table. This morning Bojun went into his room, woke him up and pushed him to come to see their father since he had missed last evening’s family dinner. 

“Did you see father’s new concubine?” Zhongyou asked. 

“Yes, of course.” Bojun replied.

“Did you call her Third Mother?” 

“Or what else should I call her?” 

Zhongyou shrugged. That was true, what else could they call her especially in their father’s presence? He got up and wandered through the study. “It is boring!” He stopped at the rear window and looked out over the lotus pond. Then his eyes were caught by that little two storied building. His mother said that the father’s new concubine was a very pretty, decent lady, which he doubted. If she was decent, why did she marry his father as a concubine? About pretty, he had seen too many pretty girls and women, who all scrambled to be his girlfriends. That night when he ran over two young men and wrecked his car in Shanghai, the woman who sat with him in the car was a very beautiful prostitute—He was drunk, and she kept fondling him. Women liked him because they knew that he had a rich father. “That concubine must be very smart. Rather than marry a rich man’s son, why not just marry that rich man? It is a much shorter, straight way, can save everyone’s time.” He stared at that building, wondering. 

Coincidentally the door of that building was pulled open and a maid came out carrying a stool. She placed that stool by the pond then returned to the house. Right after, a young woman walked out and sat on that stool. She gazed over the pond with a thoughtful look, then began to embroider. She wore a loose white gown and a pair of green ground embroidered slippers. “Her feet aren’t bound.” Zhongyou was particular to check her feet first. “It seems like this time father’s taste in women is quite different but gets better.”

He screwed up his eyes to examine her face, suddenly he heard his father’s voice: “Zhongyou!” 

He turned around and found his father standing behind him. Qian glanced out of the window and asked: “What are you doing here?” 

“Father,” Zhongyou made a bow, “this morning elder brother told me that you wanted to see me, so I came here and have been waiting for you.” 

“Where did you go last night? We waited for you for a long time.” 

“One friend of mine held a birthday party, I went there and stayed a little longer than I had expected. I am very sorry for making you wait for me father.” 

“Going forward in such cases, you should tell either your mother or your brother or me; at least let one of us know it so we won’t worry about you.” 

“Yes father, I will do it.” 

“And don’t drive the car until I give you my permission. I don’t want any troubles from the police again.” 

“Ok father.”

He left his father. His heart was still beating fiercely--It was so embarrassing that he was caught by his father peering at the new concubine. “But father didn’t say anything about that. Perhaps he understood that I was just curious since I had never seen her before. I didn’t mean to peer at her; she walked out herself!”

However, when he lay in bed that night, he thought of that woman again. “She is like a fragrant lotus blossom, beautiful and graceful. None of my girlfriends ever made embroidery for me. What pattern was she embroidering? Mandarin ducks? I wish that I could get closer and take a good look at her.” He wondered: “Father is a practical man; he must have been crazy about her, so he married her. Luck always picks him. Alas,” he made a deep sigh, “what a mess! Why do I keep thinking about her? She is father’s woman; I can do nothing about it.”

Zhongyou went out next morning. He met some friends, bought them dinner, and took a girl to a hotel. But he still felt bored: Everyone looked stupid and superficial; the girl sleeping next to him was like a pig with a long trickle of drool leaking from the corner of her mouth. How could he have gone to bed with such a woman? He even didn’t know her name! He felt disgusted with himself. “Her name should be Pig!” He put on his clothes, threw ten silver coins on the bed, then slammed the door behind him.

He boarded a rickshaw, heading for home. It was a late evening of early Autumn. The air smelled fresh and crispy; the breezes were on and off, occasionally blowing against him. First time in his life, he was touched by an unspeakable melancholy. His world had been too crowded, noisy, and messy; people came and went, only he was stuck there and didn’t know where to go.

The rickshaw pulled him to the gate of the house. He scooped out some coins from his pocket and handed them all to the puller without counting the sum. The puller was thrilled to see the highly overpaid fare; he kept bowing to the young man, repeating: “Thanks mister! Thanks mister!” After the gate was opened then closed, the puller finally pulled away his empty rickshaw and ran down along the empty street. But he was happy and figuring: “Good luck! My children’s winter shoes are settled!” 

Zhongyou didn’t go to his room. He entered the garden and walked toward the lotus pond. The light in father’s study was off, while one window on the first floor of that two storied building was still on. He stood by the pond, watching that window. “Father must be there. She is his concubine.” He could imagine that in that exquisite room, behind that lowly hanging bed curtain, his father was taking off her clothes—the outer gown first, then her underclothes… There must be one pair of embroidered mandarin ducks somewhere on her garment! Her neck was soft, her shoulders were slender; father started to kiss one her earlobe, but she turned her face to him…What a marvelous face! His eyes were burning.

The light of that window suddenly went out. He was swallowed by the endless dark.

Then Mid-Autumn Day came. As usual, the whole family would dine in the garden so they could enjoy the moon at the same time. Since morning, the servants were busy cleaning and organizing; the kitchen was occupied too, people there had to cook sixteen cold dishes, sixteen hot dishes, four kinds of main food plus eight desserts. In addition, the moon cakes needed to be freshly baked; the sweet scented Osmanthus wine must be perfectly warmed…This was one of the four biggest annual feasts, thus nobody dared to screw it up.

First Madam had visited the kitchen three times and went to the garden twice to check on things. Bitao saw her in the garden and asked: “Elder Sister, where is Jasmine? I need her help here to watch the servants. I have been working for a whole morning and now my feet are aching.” 

“Master went out with her this morning to buy festival gifts for her family.” 

“Gifts? I remember that just one week ago our kitchen sent them ten kilograms of moon cakes with four kinds of filling, as well as a set of gold dinnerware. Aren’t they enough?” 

“It is her first Mid-Autumn Festival here. We ought to be generous to her family.” First Madam passed her, speaking coldly.

When the full moon rose above the Osmanthus trees, the festival dinner began. Qian sat at the head of the table; on his right was First Madam, and the left was Jasmine; Bitao sat next to Jasmine and Bojun was on the other side of his mother; Zhongyou’s seat was at the end opposite his father.

“Zhongyou, you missed the last family dinner and the chance to meet your Third Mother. Go pour some wine for her and your father as an apology.” First Madam reminded. 

Zhongyou walked reluctantly to Qian and Jasmine, picked up a little flagon and filled their cups. “Father, may you be healthy!” But he didn’t say anything to Jasmine before he returned to his seat. 

A pleased look crossed Bitao’s face. “Hurry,” She called to everyone, “let’s start to eat, the dishes are getting cold!”

In the middle of the dinner, Qian picked one large crab and opened its shell, inside of which was filled with golden colored crab eggs. He handed the shell with eggs to Jasmine, “Try This. It isn’t easy to get these crabs, not because their price is dear, but for their very limited number. They are wild and need to grow to this size. The tools for eating crab are right here.” 

Bitao made a petty complaint to Qian: “Master, I have been with you for so many years, you never offered me any food.” 

“Hand me your plate, I will give you some as well.” Qian said. 

“No, I don’t like crab, I want duck! That duck face!” 

Qian took the duck face with chopsticks and put it on Bitao’s plate. “Now you should be happy, no more complaints.” Qian spoke in a cheerful tone. 

Bitao was delighted. She turned to Jasmine, “Younger sister, you should have more food. You are too thin! Putting on some weight will help you get pregnant sooner. You are young; I am sure master wants you to have his child.”

All of a sudden Zhongyou got up from his seat. his face was very pale. “I have had enough! Enjoy your dinner!” He left the table hurriedly before the others reacted. 

First Madam called after him: “Zhongyou, are you ok?” 

“Yes mother, I just thought of something urgent to do!” He answered loudly without turning his head.

On the way to his room, he felt annoyed with himself. “What did I do? I ruined the dinner!” He blamed himself, “How can I be jealous of my own father? It’s too crazy!”  He hit his fist onto a tree trunk. However, that physical pain still couldn’t stop him from walking to that lotus pond almost every evening. He didn’t know why he did it or if he expected anything to happen; he just wanted to go there, watching that little building from a distance, and torturing himself—That was a world which didn’t belong to him.

The weather was getting cold; Jasmine spent most of her days staying inside. Now she had one more favorite thing to do—smoking opium. Since she tried the opium in First Madam’s place, she had started to smoke it by herself. First Madam sent her one set of opium tools, as well as one box of dark opium. “The opium from Yinan of Yunnan is the best,” she told Jasmine, “Its scent can be smelled from three hundred meters. People call it ‘Creme de la creme’. It’s expensive, but not for a household like ours. You get what you pay for. Once you finish this box, I will give you more. But don’t smoke too much, it isn’t good for bearing a child.”

So, when Zhongyou wandered by the pond, Jasmine was lying in her daybed smoking opium. In most cases he only saw the shadows from the maids on the window curtains, occasionally his father’s as well, but it was rare to see Jasmine’s. He felt his heart empty. “She never knows that someone is here fascinated by her. Poor me. I wish I could get her attention even once!”  

One day while Qian was just back to his study, Bitao showed up. “Master, there is something which I think I ought to tell you. But please forgive me first if it offends you.” 

“What’s that?” Qian didn’t raise his eyes and continued to check the files on his writing table. 

“It is about your younger son. He seems to have been wandering at the lotus pond for weeks. One evening I happened to see him when I passed by; and yesterday I saw him there again at about eight o’clock.” 

“Eight o’clock?” Qian put down the files and turned his eyes to Bitao, “What did he do there?” 

“How could I know? I hid myself in the dark and observed for a while; he just paced back and forth then sat on the ground against the light coming from Jasmine’s window. It was cold so I left soon. But I think something there attracts him.”

Qian walked about the room, then went to the window. Suddenly he thought of that early afternoon he found his son watching Jasmine from this window; and when he, Qian, questioned him as to why he was in the study, he looked nervous and guilty. However, Zhongyou was his son, a well-educated young man whom he had known for twenty-three years; it seemed impossible for the son to have fancies about the father’s concubine, even though in general Zhongyou wasn’t that serious. He must be mistaken, Qian told himself

Qian dismissed Bitao and walked to Jasmine’s building. The door was closed from inside, he pushed it open. Jasmine wasn’t in the living room, nor the bedroom. For some reason he started to get nervous. Then he came into the dressing room and found a maid there. 

“Where is madam?” Qian asked. 

“Madam is bathing.” 

The tension in his mind was relieved. He returned to the living room and sat on the daybed. Something that seemed like a folded paper on the floor caught his attention. He bent down and picked it up— “To Jasmine”, it wrote:

“Clouds appreciate gorgeous clothes,

blossoms dream about pretty faces,

Spring breeze blows down your screens,

unveiling a lady from paradise.

Beautiful flowers and beautiful lady,

both are my pursuit and make me crazy;

Spring comes then goes waiting for nobody,

you stand alone in a gazebo watching a peony.”

He refolded the paper and put it in his pocket. “Did someone come here before?” Qian asked the maid who was bringing in his tea. 

“No Master, only Madam was here.” 

“How long has she been bathing?” 

“About half an hour. Before that Madam was napping in the bedroom.” 

Qian nodded. Jasmine and the maids mustn’t have seen this paper, or else it wouldn’t be on the floor. He re-examined the place where he found the paper--It was right under the window, so it could be that someone wedged the paper through the sill while Jasmine was either napping or bathing. That person knew very well that normally he wouldn’t be here at such a time, and that the maids couldn’t read so whoever found the paper would give it to Jasmine. Qian shivered—Was it the first time this happened? Or had it happened before? If Jasmine saw the paper, what would she think? Would she tell him about it? She was young and obedient, wasn’t skilled enough to resist another man’s pursuit, especially during the daytime when he wasn’t at home; anything could happen to her. 

He opened the paper again: From its disguised handwriting, the style of the poems, as well as Bitao’s reminder, it wasn’t hard for him to guess who did it. “It will be awfully terrible if something happened between them. He is a willful young man with nothing to do every day. Perhaps I should send him off somewhere for a while to chill him out; at the same time, he will be on his own to seek some fun.” 

Next morning Bojun went into Zhongyou’s room. “Brother,” Bojun pushed Zhongyou, who was lying in bed facing down, “Tomorrow I will have a trip to Beijing, father wants you to go with me. He said that you should start to get involved in our business.” 

“No, I am not interested in it, I won’t go!” Zhongyou covered his head with a blanket. 

“Don’t be childish! Father told me that you must go. It will only take about three weeks; and father has given his word that this time I shouldn’t restrain you, you can do whatever you like there but one exception: No driving.”

The deal sounded great! Zhongyou had never been to Beijing before, he heard from his friends that a man could do a lot of fun things there, perhaps he even could go visit Tianjin; in addition, yesterday he just wedged a paper with two ancient poems on it into Jasmine’s room, which made him excited, yet fearful and guilty. He knew it was stupid; but on the other hand, he wanted very much to reveal his secret to her, despite the fact that most likely she wouldn’t know it was from him. In the worst case if he was caught later, he would just simply explain that it was his little harmless joke. He had done more than what he should have done, so time to be a runaway and cool down his guts. 

He spent three wild weeks in Beijing. However, when he boarded the train and headed for Wuxi, he felt a strong lovesickness. He wished that the train could go faster and faster, so he would be back home before noon, before his father was there; then probably he could make an excuse to see her.

“Why do I love her so much? I must be mad.” He kept wondering. She was pretty, but not the only pretty one, and in fact he believed that each girl had her own charm. So what made him crazy about her? He never even talked with her; it would be too strange if he tried to excuse himself by saying that he loved her soul and heart. Therefore, the only possible reason for him to fall in love with her was, she was his father’s concubine, she was unreachable compared to all the other girls whom he had gotten effortlessly. Because of that, his desire for conquest was inflamed, and he felt a tremendous pleasure which was blended with evil vs lust, guilt vs excitement, destruction vs resurrection. “I must see her! I can’t wait any longer! I don’t care about what will happen to me and her! If we will be destroyed together, I will go for it!” The long-time suppressed emotion about her instantly exploded in his mind.

He arrived at his house around noon. He threw his baggage to the servants and ran toward the lotus pond. It was as lonesome as before. All the leaves of the trees on the banks had fallen and were piled on the ground like a thick brown carpet. When he ran over them, he could hear a very pleasant crispy rustle under his feet. The pond was almost empty, except for several dry lotus leaves and stalks standing here and there motionlessly. He slowed down his steps. All around was silent; the world seemed to have fallen into an eternal sleep. A strong fear possessed his heart: She must be gone!

He walked to the building. The door was half closed. He peered inside. Jasmine was dozing on the daybed; by her side her opium pipe was out, while the lamp was still on. In front of the daybed, a big fire pan was blazing next to her green slippers, on which large red and pink peonies were embroidered. 

Bewitched by the cozy, fragrant, and leisurely atmosphere in that room, he snuck in. Nobody else was there. He closed the door and tiptoed to Jasmine. She was still in her doze like a full bloomed sleeping peony. He knelt on the floor, reached out his trembling hands to touch her bare foot—It was warm and smooth. He pressed his feverish lips against it, then gently moved up his hands to her ankle, to her calf…His heart was beating in a violent way which made him believe that it could jump out of his body at any time. Everything had disappeared from him, only she was left. Carried away by an enormous desire, he just wanted to go on—His brain became blank, his eyes became blind, his mouth became numb, his ears…

A maid came up from another room. She was shocked upon seeing Zhongyou but bounced back right away and ran into the rear room. 

“What happened?” Another maid asked her curiously. 

“The Young Master, he, he is in the living room, s-stroking Madam! He looks like enchanted!” The first maid stuttered. 

After hearing that, the second one immediately rushed into the living room, berating: “What are you doing Young Master?!”

Shocked, Zhongyou regained his senses. He flung open the door in great haste and rushed out.

Jasmine was still in her deep, psychedelic dream.