The Last Empress (30 page)

"Kang Yu-wei has talked His Majesty into issuing death warrants for the officers who refused their dismissals," Yung Lu's message read. "I have been ordered to arrest Li Hung-chang, who the reformers believe has been the major roadblock. I am sure it won't be long before I receive the order for my own execution."

Should I open the gate? Things seemed to be falling apart. How could the dynasty survive without Li Hung-chang and Yung Lu?

"The newly dismissed ministers and officers have come to kneel in front of the palace gate." Li Lien-ying looked overwhelmed.

I went out and crossed the courtyard and looked through the gate. Casting long shadows in the dying sunlight, the crowd was on its knees.

"Open it," I said to Li Lien-ying.

Two of my eunuchs pushed the gate open.

The crowd turned silent the moment I appeared on the terrace.

I was expected to speak, and I had to bite my tongue in order to swallow the words.

I remembered my promise to Guang-hsu. My son was only
exercising his rights as Emperor, I told myself. He deserved complete independence.

The crowd stayed on its knees. It hurt me to see that people were filled with hope in me.

I turned around and told Li Lien-ying to shut the gate.

Behind me the crowd stirred, rising to its feet and muttering louder and louder.

Later I would learn that Yung Lu had other reasons to join the dismissed officials. While working on building the navy, he kept an eye on foreign governments to make sure they were not connected with subversive elements in China. However, intelligence showed that British and American missionaries and English adventurers with military backgrounds were secretly agitating in favor of a constitutional monarchy. Although Yung Lu's true purpose was to avoid being forced to crack down on reform, which by then had turned into a country-wide movement, he was especially alarmed by the high level of subversive activity going on at the Japanese legation. The suspected agents were members of the Genyosha Society, ultranationalists who were responsible for Queen Min's assassination in Korea.

Prince Ts'eng, his son and Prince Ch'un Junior were convinced that Kang Yu-wei was supported by the foreign powers as a cover for an armed coup.

Yung Lu said in a message to me, "The Emperor's trust in Kang Yu-wei has made my work impossible."

"I have no option but to support the throne," I wrote back to Yung Lu. "It is up to you to block any uprising."

Early one morning Yung Lu appeared unannounced at my palace. "Ito Hirobumi is on his way to Peking." Ito was the architect of Japan's Meiji Restoration and had served as prime minister during our recent war. He had played a leading role in the murder of Queen Min.

"Is ... Ito not afraid?" I asked. "Guang-hsu could order his beheading for what Japan has done to China."

Yung Lu paused a moment and then replied, "Your Majesty, Ito comes as the Emperor's guest."

"My son invited him?"

"Ito claims that he has retired from politics and is now a private citizen."

"Does Li Hung-chang know about this?"

"Yes. In fact, he sent me. While Li feels that it is no longer his role to offer the throne advice, he didn't want you to get the news from the Ironhats."

"His enemies accuse him of being self-serving, but our friend has always embodied what is most kind and wise in the Chinese character."

Yung Lu agreed. "Li refuses to offer the Ironhats an opportunity to jeopardize the Emperor's reform plans."

According to my son, Ito's visit was initiated by Kang Yu-wei and arranged by his disciple, a twenty-three-year-old scholar-adventurer named Tan Shih-tung. I remembered Tan had written an extraordinary
analytical essay on Japan, and knew his father, who was the governor of Hupeh.

Like his master Kang Yu-wei, Tan had also failed the national civil service examination. He was quoted as having called the government post his father once offered him "a beggar's livelihood." Together with Kang Yu-wei, Tan became known for publishing letters condemning the Imperial examination system. He was second in command in the Emperor's new council.

In my view, Tan's belief in Ito as China's savior was naive and dangerous. I did not doubt Ito's ability to manipulate the Emperor, so it would be pointless for me to try to persuade my son to dismiss Ito.

"You'd be a fool to invite yourself," Yung Lu offered as we discussed Guang-hsu's meeting with the Japanese. "They would just shut up and look for another opportunity to meet privately."

Over the next few days Yung Lu and I sought Li Hung-chang's advice.

"The Japanese intelligentsia have already become part of the fiber of our society, as they had done in Korea," Li warned in a letter. "Ito's move will further Japan's penetration."

I begged Li Hung-chang to travel north to help. "You must personally receive Ito so he knows that my son is not alone."

Li did not respond to this plea, so I officially summoned him. I felt I needed his advice in person. There was no telling what might happen, especially as my son had not said a word to me about his plans.

After Yung Lu left at the end of each day, my frustration would overwhelm me. Li Hung-chang still hadn't responded, and I was worn out by the mere mention of Ito's name. I understood my son's fascination with the man. But if they met, Ito would quickly discover all the shortcomings of the Emperor of China.

I feared that my son would hastily move to replace China's feudal power blocs with Japanese sympathizers. In fact, he had already begun doing so. The pro-Japan scholar Tan's appointment as emissary between Ito and Guang-hsu was but a prelude. The Emperor fancied China as a power broker among modern industrial nations—but Japan would be calling the shots. And my son would be none the wiser.

On September 11, 1898, Yung Lu welcomed Ito Hirobumi to China. The former prime minister was received in Tientsin. A few days later, on his arrival in Peking by train, Li Hung-chang met with him.

Yung Lu had few words to describe the guest. It was as if he wished to forget the experience as soon as possible. "I have received five messages from the throne asking me to bring Ito to the Forbidden City," Yung Lu said. Although he told me he was uncomfortable throughout the reception, he did his best to show hospitality.

"Ito must have sensed that our welcome was not heartfelt," Yung Lu remarked. "I don't know how he managed to maintain his poise and offer his gratitude."

It was from Li Hung-chang that I learned more details. "Ito carries himself in the style of a samurai," Li said. In his opinion, Ito was a genius. Li envied him his service to the Japanese Emperor and his success in reforming his country. Li would never forget the humiliation he had suffered before Ito at the negotiating table. "Ito was shameless, virtue-less and ruthless. He was also the hero of his country."

I remembered the nights when Li negotiated the Shimonoseki Treaty. I counted every tael of war compensation paid, every hectare of land we were forced to part with. Li Hung-chang's telegrams came like a snow squall in January. My eunuch wore out his shoes shuttling messages between Li Hung-chang and me.

It had been like talking to the Great Wall when I tried to make Guang-hsu appreciate Li's negotiating efforts. "You should at least acknowledge that Li Hung-chang has been bearing the blame that should have been ours."

"Li Hung-chang deserves nothing but our loathing," Guang-hsu had responded.

Under the influence of Kang Yu-wei, my son ignored the telegrams Li sent concerning Ito's visit.

I was upset and said to my son, "You don't get tired because Li is the one carrying the heavy load."

"Well, I don't need him. I fired him long ago. You are the one who invited him back."

"I invited him because Russia and Japan won't talk peace with anybody else!"

"Mother, don't you find it suspicious?"

"What?"

"Li's foreign connections?"

When I learned that my son had again dismissed Li Hung-chang, I refused to speak to him for days. Guang-hsu had his eunuchs bring me an offering of lotus-seed soup, but he was not apologizing.

I held on to Li's telegrams until Guang-hsu couldn't bear to hear the
name of Li Hung-chang anymore. My son insisted that China would be better off without him.

Instead of acknowledging Li Hung-chang's devotion, my son believed that every negative development was the result of Li's manipulation.

I began to realize that Guang-hsu lived in his own fantasy world. Like his mentor Tutor Weng, whom he had just fired, he hated yet worshiped Japan. In the future I would blame myself for believing that my son was capable of good judgment.

Guang-hsu despised me for continuing to seek help from Li Hung-chang, and I despised myself for being incapable of ending the trouble.

In responding to the throne's "Ito is no threat to China" edict, Li wrote in a memorandum: "In the world's eyes, Ito gives the impression that he is a supporter of Chinese culture. He might be a moderate, he might have opposed Japan's true political bosses like the militarist Yamagata Aritomo and other godfathers of the Genyosha, but he nevertheless conducted the Sino-Japanese War. China has fallen into a deep well because of its self-indulgence and ignorance, while Japan has proven capable of throwing heavy rocks."

I wished that I could tell my son how much I hated Ito. I wanted to yell, "Go and talk to the Emperor of Japan man to man instead of blaming Li Hung-chang!"

I had reasons not to respond to foreign and domestic attacks on me. It was to make sure that my son would not be held responsible for his possible failure. I betrayed Li Hung-chang in that sense—by purposely ignoring his warnings, I made Li a scapegoat. On my part, it was a self-betrayal before anything else.

I wondered if Li regretted his devotion.

Forgiveness was a gift I could not afford but which I fortunately received from Li Hung-chang.

There was no other way to love my son.

Guang-hsu wanted to prove to me that he and Ito could be friends. I did not know that they had scheduled to meet privately before the official meeting on September 20, to which I was invited.

It was impossible for me to concentrate on anything else. My son's words rang danger in my ears. "Mother, Ito only seeks to help me!"

I fought on the issue of trust, but my son's mind was made up.

I did not want to bring up Yung Lu's spy report, but I felt that I couldn't afford not to. "Japan's intrigues have been set in motion by
Yamagata," I said to Guang-hsu. "Yamagata is the leading promoter of Japanese expansion and lord protector of the Genyosha."

"You have no proof that Ito is part of the Genyosha." My son was more than annoyed. "Yung Lu has fabricated this information to prevent me from meeting Ito!"

"But shouldn't we trust Yung Lu and Li Hung-chang more than Ito?" I pleaded.

"The only thing I can say is that Yung Lu has made himself an obstacle to reform. I should have dismissed him."

I went to sit down, weakened by what I was hearing.

"I am firing Yung Lu, Mother," Guang-hsu said in a flat voice.

I screamed, "For heaven's sake, Yung Lu is the last Manchu general who would die for you!"

My son stormed out.

Two days later I sent an apology to Guang-hsu along with Li Hung-chang's newly arrived telegram. It read, "The spy network set up by Genyosha agents has been operating under cover of a pharmaceutical syndicate with the trade name 'Halls of Pleasurable Delights.' To maintain their secrecy, the spies travel the countryside as salesmen. There is no evidence suggesting that the Japanese army, navy, diplomats and the representatives of Japan's trading houses, the zaibatsu, weren't behind Genyosha's assassinations, kidnappings and extortions."

The Emperor's secret meetings with Ito provoked a backlash among the court's conservatives. Led by Prince Ts'eng, the Iron-hats pressed me to replace Guang-hsu on the throne. At the same time, Ts'eng prepared his Moslem troops in the northwest to move toward Peking. I was caught in the middle, unable to decide and unable to get out.

When the minister of the royal cemetery requested my presence for an inspection, I used it as a pretext to escape the Forbidden City. Li Lien-ying hired a carpenter to make an adjustable seat for my horse carriage so I could ride in a reclining position. I bounced and dozed through the three-day journey covering 125 kilometers from Peking to Hupeh province.

By the time I arrived at the cemetery it was early morning. The sky was overcast and a fine mist fell over the blue rivers. White bridges, golden roofs, red walls and cypress trees formed breathtaking views.

The cemetery minister greeted me at the Grand Sacred Way. An elderly man who was hard of hearing, he apologized for the dirt and mud and said that Nuharoo's tomb was being repaired.

"Wild animals dug up the ground and damaged the drainage system," the minister explained. "A few of the tombs, including Empress Nuharoo's, flooded during the last storm."

I thought about how Nuharoo would have hated the flood and asked, "How soon will the repairs be completed?"

"I am embarrassed to say that I can't give you an exact date," he
replied. "The work has been sporadic. Sometimes we have to stand idle for weeks while we appeal for more funds."

I was led to my own tomb, which seemed well maintained.

"It flooded too, but I gave the repair work top priority." The minister was not humble about claiming credit.

My tomb stood next to Nuharoo's like a twin sister. When Tung Chih ascended the throne in 1862, he ordered construction to begin on our tombs. It took thirteen years to complete the outer tomb and another five years to finish the interior.

Having reached the age of sixty-three, I had become familiar with the process of death. I continued to attend sacrificial ceremonies whenever I could. I honored the gods of all religions, not just Buddha. I believed in paying attention to the force of energy inside me. Not everyone would be lucky enough to achieve the Great Void, but I understood that the point was to try. I struggled to balance yin and yang, however difficult it seemed to be.