Falling Leaves: The True Story of an Unwanted Chinese Daughter (34 page)

’I talked to Edgar and Lydia. Edgar refused point blank to give you anything. At first Lydia also said no. I reminded her that our parents had disowned her and, were it not for you, she certainly would not have inherited a cent. Finally she agreed to give you 5 per cent, but on condition that you make a full confession.’

’A full confession? What do I have to confess to?’ I was incredulous.

’That’s what I asked her. She wasn’t sure either. She called your unexpected disinheritance a wu tou gong an (headless and clueless case). She wants you to confess to the real reasons behind it. It’s her Communist training. She likes to hear confessions. They make her feel powerful. In China during the Cultural Revolution, people were confessing all over the place.’

’So Lydia wants to hear my true confession. Well, I would like to know the reasons myself. Tell Lydia to keep her money, Gregory,’ I said. ’I don’t want anything from her.’

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Opened the Door to Salute the Thief

Bob and I awoke with a start at five p.m., having slept the afternoon away. We rushed out and hailed a taxi to Magnolia Mansions. On the marble landing of the tenth floor we were assailed by Niang’s familiar odour of perfume, mothballs and stale cigarette smoke. How often I had waited at this threshold with sweaty palms and palpitating heart! Ah Fong opened the teak front door and outer steel gate.

Inside, all looked the same. There were the antique paintings by Castiglione, the eighteenth-century Italian Jesuit priest in the court of Emperor Qian Long. Niang had cut these masterpieces short to accommodate her furniture arrangement. Against one wall stood four elaborately carved redwood chairs, purportedly belonging at one time to the last Emperor of China. Facing the harbour were her imitation Louis XVI couches. On the Qing dynasty coffee-table lay the silver Tiffany box I had sent her as a birthday present sixteen years ago. Next to it perched a gold cigarette lighter Bob had given her for Christmas. Once, years ago, I advised her to stop smoking. ’Leave me alone!’ she had snapped. ’I don’t need you to tell me that smoking is harmful to my health. It’s written on every cigarette package.’ After a while she added, somewhat pathetically, ’It’s the one pleasure I have left since your father became ill.’ I made no reply because what she said was true.

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Ah Fong hovered around us asking if we would like refreshment. Suddenly we remembered that we had not eaten lunch. Bob asked her, in his halting Cantonese, if she would make us some tea and toast. Then, not wishing to delay further, we entered Niang’s bedroom to start the search.

After the onset of Father’s illness, Niang had moved out of the master bedroom into a smaller room facing the steep, green mountain slope behind the flat. It was furnished with a single bed, an antique Chinese writing desk and chair, a night stand with a talking clock we had given her some years before, a free-standing wardrobe and a built-in closet.

I rummaged through the wardrobe and saw a row of dresses neatly hanging, dozens of pairs of shoes on racks like parading soldiers and empty handbags lying side by side on a shelf above. No will there. The sight of her personal belongings brought on waves of nausea. The weak overhead ceiling light and small table lamp by her bed cast sinister shadows. I felt a constriction in my chest provoked by the power of her aura; my senses were saturated with her smell.

I next approached her antique Chinese desk. Six years ago, Niang had offered to leave this very desk to Bob. ’Carved by skilled craftsmen from the finest blackwood during the Ming dynasty,’ I remembered Niang saying. Was she already lying then? I looked hard at the elaborate design as I carefully tested the smooth glide of the top drawer and pulled it open.

The stacks of letters struck me at once. Piles and piles of airmail envelopes totalling perhaps two hundred letters, neatly sorted into rows. I stared at the familiar, small, spidery handwriting on the envelopes and the brightly coloured stamps of the People’s Republic of China. All came from Tianjin and were addressed to Mrs Joseph Yen. All were written by Lydia.

The sight of these letters rooted me to the spot. Why was Lydia writing to Niang almost every other day’ In a trance I pulled out the top letter from its envelope. As I started to read, the ache in my chest gripped me like a vice. I felt dizzy, as if I

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was standing on the top ledge of a skyscraper, looking down and seeing the earth sway beneath me.

Letter after letter was filled with lies and venom, inciting Niang to hate me. Though I was ’cruel, selfish and miserly’, Lydia had written, she was advising Niang to tread carefully in front of the despised Adeline, for Niang was no longer in a position of strength. She accused me of disobedience because I had kept in touch with Susan and had even rallied her and all my brothers behind me in a joint effort to help Tai-way for the sole purpose of sabotaging Niang’s commands. The year 1997 was fast approaching when Hong Kong would be governed by Beijing. She played on Niang’s fears and paranoia by writing that I was urging James to emigrate so that Niang would be abandoned and forced to live out her last years alone. She then swore Niang to secrecy.

Immediately beneath them were other letters, from Samuel and Tailing, making similar accusations. With a leaden heart, I realized that by going against Niang’s wishes and helping Lydia’s family I had kai men yi dao (opened the door to salute the thief).

As I turned to show Lydia’s letters to Bob, he gave a jubilant shout from his side of the room. He had been searching Niang’s closet and was clearly a better sleuth than I. Triumphantly he waved a document in front of me. It was my father’s will.

Bob and I sat on the edge of Niang’s bed and read Father’s will over and over. I heard once again my father’s voice. It was as if he had raised himself out of his grave to embrace me. His wishes soothed the ache in my heart.

My father’s will, signed long before his illness on 2. May

1974, was radically different from the one written by Niang on

2. June 1988, less than three weeks after his death. Father had divided his estate into seven shares. He left one share to me, one share to Gregory, one share to Edgar, two shares to James and two shares to his grandchildren with the last name of Yen. No share was left to Susan. Father also wrote in his will the

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following sentence: ’I further would like to record that no share of my estate is to go to my daughter, Lydia Yen Sung.’

Clutching Father’s will, I hugged my husband. ’In the end, Niang’s will doesn’t matter. Whatever happens, this, my father’s will, is what is important to me. He at least did not exclude me. Perhaps he loved me after all. Besides,’ I added, ’James will do the right thing. He is the executor and he is an honest man.’

Randomly, we picked up a few of Lydia’s letters and placed them with Father’s will in my handbag. Sitting in the cab as it crept back to our hotel, Bob held my hand and said, ’Remember, you’ll always have me …’

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Steal the Bell While Covering Your Ears

Next morning, James and I met for breakfast at a dim sum shop. We sat facing each other on old-fashioned, low red stools around a matching table. The restaurant was tastefully decorated in the 19105 ’Old Shanghai’ style with lazily whirring overhead ceiling fans, latticed windows, gleaming parquet floor, period photographs, potted bamboos and bunches of fresh chrysanthemums. We were the only customers.

Outside, the rain poured down in sheets. Tea was served and we each ordered a bowl of soup noodles. Silently I handed over Father’s will. James was astounded that we had found it so easily, repeating that he and Mr Lu had searched ’everywhere’ without success.

’I would like to keep this will. It’s meaningless, of course, but I want to hand it over to the probate lawyer.’

’Besides the will,’ I said, ’we also found many letters in Niang’s writing desk. Maybe a couple of hundred. Most of them were from Lydia. We took a few of them with us when we left Niang’s flat last night.’

I pulled out the small sheaf of letters from my handbag and laid them next to Father’s will. James glanced down at them with a frown. He compressed his lips. I had seen this expression many times before, usually towards the end of a hard-fought chess game, just before his final move towards checkmate.

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’You had no right to touch those letters, let alone remove them from Niang’s desk,’ he said icily. ’Those letters are private!’

’I think you should read them. See here,’ I said emphatically, ’this letter is dated 7 October 1987. While I was trying to help her children, Lydia was plotting against me.’

’I don’t want to read these poison letters.’

’But don’t you want to know the truth?’ I asked pathetically. ’You can’t yan er dao ling (steal the bell while covering your ears)!’

’Is there such a thing as absolute truth?’ he answered rhetorically. ’It all depends on a person’s viewpoint. In any case, it’s all water under the bridge. Suan le (let it be)/ Besides, I hate confrontations! Remember, if you challenge the will, you’ll be challenging me. And if you and I end up in court over this, then we would be caught in Niang’s trap, because that would be precisely what the Old Lady wanted.’

’You were caught in her net a long time ago. She had always had her way with you. You were no match for her. Lydia alone was devious enough to compete with her.’

James laughed. ’You are right! They’re two of a kind. You learned this too late to your cost. It was you who brought about the reconciliation between Lydia and Niang. If they had not met in 1986, matters would have turned out very differently.’ He put down his chopsticks and signalled for the bill. ’Your problem, Adeline, is that you’re always transferring your own feelings and reasonings into others. You wanted to believe that we all shared your dream of a united family. In fact, no one cared except for you. Look, it’s getting late. I have to go now.’ His eyes met mine in a steady and obstinate gaze. He got up, clutching Father’s will and Lydia’s letters tightly in his hands. ’I’ll send you a photocopy of Father’s will. As for these letters, they’re private and they will be burnt.’

We walked out into the pouring rain. It seemed as if the whole world was weeping. Throughout our childhood, youth and middle age, we had stood shoulder to shoulder on every

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important issue. Over the years, Niang must have resented this special bond between us. In the end, seeking to destroy it, she had baited James into participating in a fraud he detested. Nothing would have pleased her more than to see the two of us at each other’s throats, fighting over her legacy.

As I watched him hurry away, hunched against the rain, I called after him, ’.HL-lfM San ge! (Third Elder Brother)! It was a great misfortune for us to have had Niang for a stepmother. Don’t worry, I won’t contest her will. I will never allow her to triumph over me.’

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CHAPTER 32.

Luo Ye Gui Gen

Falling Leaves Return to Their Roots

On an overcast March day in 1994, I received a letter from my aunt begging me to go to her in Shanghai. The news enveloped me in gloom, mirroring the unseasonably chilly Southern Californian weather. As I went about my daily routine at the surgical centre, there was an ache which jolted me whenever I thought of her dying alone in her big house.

Inside, a quiet, small voice whispered that this visit would be the last. Instinctively, I recoiled from the intolerable thought that Aunt Baba would soon be gone for ever. Throughout the long flight from Los Angeles to Shanghai via Tokyo, I made elaborate plans to take her to America and have her seen by the best specialists.

Shanghai in the 19905 had been transformed into a city bursting with energy and vitality. Cars jammed the streets. Tall brown cranes dotted building sites. The horizon was sheathed in a hazy film of dust as old buildings were toppled and replaced.

Once more, I entered the familiar lane where she had lived for the last fifty years. It was now littered with broken concrete and construction material. I wound my way around shining motor cycles and imported luxury automobiles. From the garden, I pushed open the newly painted French glass doors, stepped into the old livingroom which was now her

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bedroom and embraced my aunt and all my beginnings.

She was bedridden following a fall which broke her hip. X-rays showed that she had cancer of the colon which had already spread. To my surprise, I found her cheerful and free from pain, perhaps because of the small doses of morphine she was being given. She was surrounded by neighbours and friends who congregated at her bedside day and night. In this cosy, noisy, gregarious world of the ’all-Chinese’ sickbed, so different from the stark, sterile solitude of the American hospital room, her life had assumed the astounding quality of a continuous farewell party.

Bob, who had accompanied me, had been learning Mandarin. He tried his newly acquired skills on my aunt, though, in truth, it resembled no dialect I had ever heard. After a while, Aunt Baba interrupted him in the middle of a long and convoluted sentence, asking what tongue he was speaking. When told it was Mandarin, she commented mischievously, ’Next time, before you start talking to me in Chinese, please give me advance notice, ”I am going to speak to you in Mandarin now.” Unless forewarned, my old ears might think you’re still speaking English.’

I had returned once again to the warm cocoon of Aunt Baba’s world, safe in the knowledge that she was the one person to whom I would always matter. Here, clasping each other’s hands and listening to her lilting Shanghai speech, I forgot the throb that had been pounding my head ever since I learned of her illness. Instead of fear and discontent, Aunt Baba was floating in tranquil euphoria. She categorically refused to consider surgery or even hospitalization, gently chiding me for my grandiose plans of rescue which she labelled ’macabre’ and ’unnatural’.

’I have had a good run of eighty-nine years. It is time to accept the end. Since there is no hope of a cure, why prolong the agony of dying?’