China by Edward Rutherfurd (latest novels to read TXT) 📗

then out by a gate onto the wooded slope. A curving, stepped pathway led them up about fifteen feet to a ledge overlooking the house, where a charming little pavilion with a Chinese roof had been constructed. So this, Mei-Ling realized, was what she’d mistaken for a bell tower from a distance. “My little hermitage,” Guanji explained.

It was very simple. A good-sized single room. Against the far wall was a desk with a chair and some open shelves on the wall above it, on which she could see a dozen sealstones awaiting their owner’s attention. Some papers on the desk and a tray with writing equipment suggested that the general had been working there earlier in the day. A small cabinet beside the desk, a clothes chest in one corner, and a handsome divan directly opposite the window completed the furnishings.

Mei-Ling looked at the divan. “You sleep up here?”

“Usually.” The general smiled. “I am just ‘a hermit with a bed full of books.’ ”

She caught the reference—to a famous poem about the onset of winter and old age. She glanced at him cynically. “I am sure you find ways of keeping warm, General,” she said, then inwardly cursed herself. It might sound as if she were flirting with him.

If so, he courteously ignored it. “There’s no fire up here, as you see. But as a soldier I grew used to sleeping in tents or even in the open.” He gestured to the window. “I like the fresh air. Normally I sleep here until well into the autumn. Then I go back into the house for the winter.”

Bright Moon had already gone to the window to look out. It was a wide window, without any hangings, but with big wooden shutters to keep out the rain and the wind. The shutters were wide open now, and there was a wonderful view over the house and garden below and across the lovely waters of the West Lake. Mei-Ling joined her, and mother and daughter remained there in silence while, behind them, the two men talked.

The general was showing Mr. Yao one of his new purchases. Mei-Ling couldn’t hear exactly what the general was telling him, but she heard the merchant reply, “Ah. Most interesting.”

Bright Moon was whispering to her. “I could stay up here forever.” And she sighed. The remark itself was quite artless: She was just admiring the view.

But Mei-Ling didn’t like the sound of it. “Well, you can’t,” she replied in a stern mutter.

“I must look at this view,” she heard Yao say, and she moved back to make room for him to join his wife.

Meanwhile, a thought had occurred to her. “Tell me, General,” she began, “I noticed on our way up here, we left the enclosure around your house. Doesn’t that mean that anyone could walk up here from the road?”

“I suppose so. No one ever has.”

“You’re not afraid of a robber getting in one night?”

“The West Lake’s very quiet. I’ve never heard of anyone being robbed.” He smiled. “But I can defend myself.” He indicated something resting against the bedpost, something that hadn’t caught her eye before. It was a sword, a Chinese sabre. “An old soldier’s habit,” he confessed with a laugh.

“Oh, look,” called Bright Moon, who had just glanced back towards her mother. “He keeps a sword by his bed.”

“It’s to keep the other collectors away,” the general told her.

And now Mei-Ling saw it all. She saw how his seductions worked. His rank, the collection, his sympathetic ways, his secret lair overlooking the most beautiful lake in all of China, the military sword, the hint of danger, the adventure…That was how he did it.

And there, standing beside her husband, Bright Moon was imagining just such an encounter. Mei-Ling could see it in her eyes.

—

The general had led them down the path again. Bright Moon had walked with him. Mei-Ling had followed, as she supposed, with Mr. Yao. But reaching the bottom of the steps, she’d looked behind her and realized that, for some reason, the merchant had gone back to linger by the window, from which he was still gazing over the lake. Not wanting to seem to leave him behind, she paused and waited for him to come down so they could go together through the half-open gate into the garden.

And because she was standing there alone, in silence, she could overhear the words that passed between the general and her daughter.

“You were very quick about recognizing the seal on that book,” he remarked. “You could be a collector.”

“I don’t think so, General,” Bright Moon replied. “You see, I’d never really looked at any seals before—at the design, I mean. So the few I’d seen were very fresh in my mind. Children are the same. They notice everything, because it’s all fresh. But adults are so used to the daily things of life that we hardly notice them at all.”

“Perhaps. But I think you’re observant.” He paused. “There’s something very fine about you,” he said suddenly. “Your husband is a fortunate man.”

“I’m not sure he knows it.”

—

“Confucius says that a wife should obey her husband, but he forgot to say that none of us husbands are good enough for our wives.” He hadn’t quite said it, thought Mei-Ling, but he’d as good as said it, those words that every discontented wife wants to hear: You are too fine for your husband.

“I shall look forward to showing you all the beauty spots on the lake,” the general said, “when your boat arrives.”

“When the boat arrives.”

Mei-Ling turned. Mr. Yao was descending. He reached her.

“Here we are at last,” she said as they came through the gate.

—

The general did not, like the emperor in the story, pour the tea himself. An elderly woman servant performed the ceremony as they sat in the main hall.

They talked of this and that. The general told them that although they mightn’t think it, given the pleasant autumn weather today, he expected bad weather ahead. “I can always read the