Peony

VIII

DAVID WOKE. HE WAS in his bed. It was night and dark except for the glimmer of light from the small bean-oil night lamp set on the table outside the bed curtains. Night? But the sun had been shining!

“Leah,” he called faintly.

Peony heard him instantly. She was sitting on a hard stool, purposely uncomfortable so that she would not doze and would hear the slightest change even in David’s breathing. Now she tiptoed to the bed, parted the curtains, and looked down on him. His waking eyes looked up at her.

“Leah,” he whispered again.

“Leah is asleep,” Peony said.

She took her soft silk handkerchief and wiped his cheeks and lips.

“I feel — weak,” he muttered.

“You need food,” she replied. “Lie still.” She let the curtains fall, and going to a small charcoal brazier set on the table she took the lid from a pot simmering on the coals, and with a long-handled ladle she dipped the soup of rice and red sugar into a bowl. She moved in quietness, soft in all she did, and she went back to the bed.

“I will feed you,” she said tenderly.

She feared lest David ask her how he came to be lying in his bed. But he did not ask. He drank slowly, mouthful by mouthful, the warm sweet mixture. Red sugar was to make blood. Then he had lost much blood. That was why he was weak. His head pained him greatly. He remembered why this was. Leah had struck him with the sword. He saw her wild beautiful face, her hands holding the uplifted sword. As long as he lived he would remember. Nothing she could say or do would make him forget. And she was sleeping!

“My head hurts me,” he muttered.

“I will give you a little opium,” Peony said, going back to the table. She prepared the opium pipe, heating the pill of opium until it was soft, and then going back to the bed she put the mouthpiece to David’s lips.

“Breathe it in, Young Master,” she said.

He breathed it in again and again and the fumes curled about the paths of his brain. The pain eased and in the gradual relief he saw Peony’s face, surrounded by light.

“How kind — how — how kind — how kind—” he began, and he could not leave off babbling.

She put her hand on his lips and stilled them. “I love you,” she said distinctly. “I could never hurt you — I love you. Do you hear me?”

He smiled in delightful drowsiness and could not answer. He sank into velvet softness, smelled fragrance, heard music, saw Peony’s face over and over again, tender with love, and his eyes closed.

When Peony was sure he slept, she felt the pulse in his wrist. It was stronger than it had been. She could leave him safely for the few moments she needed to go and tell Madame Ezra that he had waked and had eaten and now was sleeping again. Silently she went into the other room and passed Old Wang, sleeping in a chair beside the table, his head on his folded arms. Ezra had commanded him to stay the night, ready for Peony’s bidding. Pitying him in his sleep, Peony went on without waking him.

The house was strange at night, silent in the soft darkness. She walked lonely through one court and the next. At each gate a paper lantern was hung to guide her, and she followed the dim light. When she passed her own court Small Dog heard her and pattered after her, sniffing and yawning.

Thus they came to Madame Ezra’s court. A light burned in the bedroom and there Peony went. Madame Ezra was sitting up against pillows, asleep in her bed. She had not meant to sleep, doubtless, but weariness had been too much for her. Her head was thrown back, her mouth was slightly open, and she was breathing deeply.

Peony stood between the parted curtains, and dreaded to wake her. “Mistress — Mistress,” she called. She made her voice very soft at first, then louder, winning back the wandering troubled soul.

Madame Ezra choked and started. “Eh!” she cried, and opening her eyes, she started forward and stared at Peony. Her soul was still only halfway home, and Peony took her hands and clapped them.

“Nothing but good news,” she murmured. “Our young lord waked, he ate, he sleeps again.”

Madame Ezra came fully to herself. “Is he asking for me?”

Now Peony did not want to say that he had not asked for his mother, so she replied, “He was still confused with pain in his head, and after he had eaten I made the pipe ready, and eased him. He is asleep again.”

“Did he say nothing?” Madame Ezra demanded. She pulled her hands away from Peony’s.

“He called Leah’s name,” Peony replied.

“What did you tell him?” Madame Ezra demanded.

“I told him she was sleeping,” Peony said.

Madame Ezra leaned back and sighed.

“I must return to him,” Peony went on.

“When he wakes do not tell him Leah is dead,” Madame Ezra commanded her.

“I will not,” Peony promised, and she went back again, pausing only to lock Small Dog into her room lest David wake.

David was still sleeping when she came to him, and Peony herself felt very weary. Now that he had eaten she did not fear so much that he might die, and she crept upon the foot of his bed and curled herself small on top of the covers and thought how she would conceal Leah’s death for a day or two, at least. So tender was David’s conscience that he would blame himself somehow for what had happened. Yet how was anyone to blame except Leah herself, and her own god-driven soul?

“How to make him believe this!” Peony murmured distressfully.

Yet he must believe it, or Leah’s power would continue over him as long as he lived. He would cling, as all his people did, to his own suffering.

“We must distract him,” Peony told herself resolutely. “We must amuse him and make him happy in spite of himself.”

Upon this resolution she fell asleep.

Yet how could Leah’s death be hidden from David? When he woke in the morning he asked no one where she was, but his eyes were thoughtful. Peony felt him stir and she was up and tending him and Ezra came in soon after dawn, before he had washed or dressed, and Madame Ezra came, wrapped in a great quilted robe, and Wang Ma came and Old Wang, and servants peered in at the door to see their young master so that they could carry the news outside. Still David asked no question of anyone. The old doctor came again and took off the silk bandages that bound David’s wound, and he stared at the black plasters that held the edges together, and declared that all was as well as possible, and he ordered the best of blood puddings.

“Pig’s blood is best,” he declared.

Ezra looked at his Naomi. “We do not eat pig, Elder Brother,” he said gently to the old Chinese physician, “but if it is necessary for my son’s life—”

“He is young and strong,” the Chinese replied, “and chicken blood will do. Were he very old I would recommend woman’s milk instead of blood.”

So chicken blood was jelled into a pudding with the liver, and red rice was cooked with spinach roots and raw eggs mingled with it, and all this went to mend David’s wasted blood. His mother sat beside him all day and his father came and went restlessly, and still David asked no one of Leah.

But the next day and the next, as he grew stronger, his ear caught certain sounds in the house. Stealthy feet came and went, and once he heard the Rabbi’s voice raised in a cry. Toward evening he heard the pounding of a carpenter’s hammer. His father and mother were with him, and Peony was heating water on the charcoal brazier.

“Mother,” David said.

Madame Ezra rose from the chair in which she was sitting and went to his bed. “Yes, my son?” Her voice was so sad and her whole manner so subdued that she seemed strange.

“Where is Leah?” David asked distinctly.

Madame Ezra turned to look at Ezra. He sat beside the table moving one thumb slowly around the other. “We had better tell him, Naomi,” he muttered.

“Have you punished Leah, Mother?” David cried out. “Ah, that was wrong.”

“God has punished her, my son,” Madame Ezra said. Suddenly she began to weep. This tall, strong, hearty woman, who all her life had taken her own way, fell into an agony of weeping. She could say no more and she hastened from the room and Ezra went after her. There was only Peony left, and it was Peony who had to tell David. She went to him and she told him in soft, gentle, quick words.

“Leah went alone into the other room, while I stood here stanching your blood with my silk girdle. She took up the sword and drew it across her own throat — and her life flowed away.”

He closed his eyes. That blade, melting through the coarse cloth of the caravan loads! He saw it sink into Leah’s flesh. Suddenly he was sick and Peony cried out and held the quilt under his mouth.

“Even dead she hurts you!” she wailed.

David fell back on his pillow exhausted. “Hush!” he gasped. “You can — never understand.”

These words dropped like stones into Peony’s soft heart. She did not reply; she could not, indeed. She lifted the quilt and took it away to be cleansed, and before she could return to David she paused behind a door and wiped her eyes with her sleeves for a moment. Then she turned aside and she entered the room where the carpenter had finished his work. The heavy camphorwood coffin was made, and the lid stood ready against the wall. Within it servants had already placed Leah’s body. They had finished their task. Peony had done nothing, nor had Wang Ma. The undermaids had worked alone. Now only one young maid remained to smooth the robes and put a candle into the folded hands, to light the dead girl’s soul upon its way.

“I covered her neck,” the maid whispered. She had thrown a fold of silk across the wound.

Peony went and looked upon Leah. The blood had drained away, and Leah’s face looked thin and unreal, as though it were made of some clear white substance. Her eyes were sunken and the long dark lashes were thick shadows on her cheeks. Her fine black hair fell back from her pale forehead and her lips were fixed and hard.

Someone stumbled at the threshold and Peony looked up. It was the Rabbi, leaning on his staff. He stretched out his hands, feeling his way on the unfamiliar ground.

“Will someone lead me to my child?” This he asked in his deep sorrowful voice, and Peony went and took his hand and led him in, and stood by him while he seemed to look at Leah’s face.

“I see my child,” he said at last. “I see her with her mother. Her mother went down to fetch her out of Hell. She will take her child before Jehovah, and she will cry to Him until He hears.”

Muttering to himself, the old Rabbi went on. “The mother will weep — she will beat her breast and Jehovah will hear her voice. Leah, my child, the Lord searcheth all hearts and understandeth all the imagination of the thoughts. If thou seek Him He will be found of thee.”

So passionate was this old man in his lonely murmuring to the dead girl that the little maid grew frightened and went away and Peony was left. She was frightened too, but she pitied the father. “Come and rest, Old Teacher,” she said sweetly, and she took the edge of his sleeve and pulled it.

At the sound of her voice the Rabbi turned on her. His blind eyes opened wide and his long white beard quivered. “Who are you, woman?” he cried in a loud voice.

Peony stood unable to move. This tall old man, towering above her, drove terror into her soul.

His great voice shouted suddenly above her head. “God hath deprived this woman of wisdom! Neither hath he imparted to her understanding! She seeketh her prey and her eyes are afar off. Where the slain are, there is she.”

He stretched out his arms as though to seize her, and Peony, seeing those great thin hands, beautiful and terrible in their strength, turned and fled as though she were indeed pursued.

The Rabbi heard her flying footsteps. He listened and a smile of cunning pleasure passed over his face. “Depart from me, ye workers of iniquity,” he muttered. He lifted his eyes and seemed to look about triumphantly. Then he sighed and with difficulty he felt his way about the room. Around and around he went, and then he came unaware to the coffin again and he felt it carefully up and down and he put in his hand and touched Leah, her feet and knees, and her cold hands. When he found the candle he took it away and threw it on the ground. Then very slowly with trembling horror on his face and agony in his finger tips he felt her wounded throat and then her thin blood-drained face. He had been told that Leah had lifted the sword against herself. Ezra had told him but he had not understood. Now the knowledge came into him and it was too much. He fell down upon the stone floor, unconscious, and so he was found, hours later, when the burial women came to fill the coffin with lime and the carpenter to close the lid. They lifted the old man up and placed him on a couch and went to tell Ezra and Madame Ezra.

“Let Aaron be brought,” Madame Ezra commanded.

But no one could find Aaron. Rachel declared that he had not come home the whole night before. There was nothing to do but tend the old man back again, and under Madame Ezra’s direction this was done. He was carried to his bed in the house and laid upon it.

It was Madame Ezra who first perceived what fresh disaster had befallen. The old Rabbi came back. He sighed, a groan burst from his lips, and he struggled as though he fought some unseen spirit. Wang Ma was watching him and she ran to call Madame Ezra. When she entered the room he opened his eyes. Madame Ezra spoke very gently. “Father, I am here.”

But the Rabbi’s sightless eyes only stared.

Wang Ma cried out in terror, “Oh, Mistress, his soul is lost!”

So indeed it was. For days the Rabbi did not speak at all. He lay on his couch, he took food, but he was silent. Even to pray he did not speak. When one day, without cause, he opened his mouth, it was to speak without knowledge. His soul was gone forever. He knew no one and remembered nothing except the days when Leah was a child, and her mother had been in the house with him.

Thus the Rabbi entered into Heaven before he died, and Ezra in the great kindness of his heart said to his servants, “Prepare a place for him. I will take care of him as long as he lives.”

He spoke without thought of his own goodness, but Madame Ezra’s heart was shaken. When the servants were gone she turned to her husband and humbled herself as she had never done before.

“You are so good,” she sobbed. They stood side by side and she put out one hand to feel for his and covered her eyes with the other. “I wish I had been better to you, Ezra.”

“Why, you have been very good, my dear,” he said pleasantly. He took her hand and held it.

“No, I have often been bad-tempered with you,” she sobbed.

“I know how often I have tried you, Naomi,” Ezra replied.

“I shall be better,” Madame Ezra promised.

“Do not be too good, my wife,” Ezra said, trying to make a joke for her comfort. “Else how can I be your match? I like to have a little temper sometimes.”

“You are good — you are good,” she insisted, and knowing her intensity, he let this pass. He drew her hand through his arm and led her out of the room, talking cheerfully as they went.

“Now, my Naomi, we must remember that our son lives, and that we have our duty to mend his life and make him happy. Little children must be born here again, and we must forget the past.”

So he talked, pressing her heart toward the future, and she subdued herself and tried to be dutiful.

“Yes, Ezra,” she murmured, “yes, yes — you are right.”

He was alarmed at such submission and anxious lest she were ill. Then he reasoned with himself that it would not last. She was a hearty woman and time would bring back her temper and her health, and so he let her say what she would. But Madame Ezra’s heart was sore with sorrow and bewildered with the downfall of all her plans and the loss of all her hopes. She grew weak, for the moment at least.

“Ezra,” she quavered when he had led her to her own rooms and had helped her into her chair, “what shall we do with our son?” This was the question that had been tearing at her thoughts ever since she saw Leah lying dead.

Ezra stood above his weeping wife, and for the first time in their life he knew himself master of this woman whom in his fashion he had loved, and he knew that now he truly loved her. He took her plump hand in his and caressed it. “Let us think only of his happiness, my dear,” he coaxed. “Let us have the wedding as quickly as possible.”

She raised wet and humble eyes to his. “You mean—” She faltered.

He nodded. “I mean the pretty child he loves, the daughter of Kung Chen. I will go to the father and we will set the day and we will bring joy into the house again.”

“But Leah—” Madame Ezra began.

Ezra spoke quickly, as though he had already decided everything. “She will be buried tomorrow, and we will allow a month’s mourning. By then David will be well.”

Madame Ezra could not answer this. A month! She bowed her head and drew away her hand.

Ezra stood for a moment longer. “Are you willing, my wife?” he asked in a full strong voice.

Madame Ezra nodded. “Yes, I am willing.” Her voice was weary and she no longer rebelled, and Ezra bent and kissed her cheek and went away without another word.

Upon the day of Leah’s burial it rained and Ezra forbade David to leave his bed. This made grief, for David had sworn himself able to get up. Leah dead had laid hold on his thoughts as Leah alive had not been able to do. He felt guilt in himself that he could not fathom. He said to himself that had he been more patient that last day she would never have lost her reason so wholly and he might have saved her. Now it seemed to him that he must follow her body to the grave.

But Ezra would not hear to it, and David was astonished by the strength in his father’s face and voice and by the power of his determination. Moreover, his mother did not speak to differ. David looked to her to take his part, but what she said astonished him still more.

“My son, obey your father,” she said.

With the two of them thus united against him, David could not contend further, and so he only rose and went to the room where Leah’s closed coffin lay. There he stood leaning on a manservant and Peony was beside him to watch lest he faint, and he stood and waited until he was left behind. The bearers lifted the heavy coffin and the few mourners followed. The Rabbi was there, wondering and smiling, but Aaron was not. Until this day Aaron had not been found, and Ezra said that he must have run away from the city.

“When all our trouble is over, I will find him and bring him back,” he told Madame Ezra. “As it is, who misses him? The Rabbi has forgotten everything, and Leah is gone.”

David stood watching and sorrowful while the little procession went through the court and out of the gate, and then he turned and went back to his bed again. There he lay with his eyes closed and Peony was too wise to speak to him. She sat beside him, letting him feel her presence in silence. David did not speak and Peony did not rouse him. She knew that sorrow must be spent before joy can take its place, but well she knew that sorrow passes, too.

Outside the city, in the lot of ground upon a hill that was the resting place of the Jews, Leah was put into the earth beside her mother. The Rabbi, her father, stood between Ezra and Madame Ezra, smiling and blind in the cool autumn sunshine. But when Ezra spoke, unexpectedly he obeyed.

“Pray, Father,” Ezra commanded in a loud voice at his ear.

The old Rabbi lifted his face to the sky. “How warm is the sun,” he murmured. And then after an instant he began thus to pray:

“Look down from heaven, and behold from the habitation of Thy holiness and Thy glory! Doubtless Thou art our Father, though Abraham be ignorant of us, and Israel acknowledges us not. Thou, O Lord, art our Father. Thy name is from everlasting. We are thine …” And then the Rabbi imagined that he was in the synagogue, and from habit he spread out his hands and cried out. “The Lord God, Jehovah, the One True God!”

Around them passers-by had stopped in curiosity to watch and stare, and the Chinese coffin bearers stood wondering in the strange presence of this old man.

Thus unwittingly did the Rabbi pray over his dead child’s grave. Ezra saw Madame Ezra weep, and he stepped between them and supported them both, and when the grave was filled and the sod packed hard upon the earth, he led them away and took them home.