The four women jumped to their feet with alacrity. "We entered the capital yesterday," they answered. "Our lady has taken our young lady today into the palace to pay their homage. That"s why she bade us come and give you their compliments, and see how the young ladies are getting on."
"You hadn"t paid a visit to the capital for ever so many years," dowager lady Chia smilingly observed, "and here you appear now quite unexpectedly!"
The four women simultaneously smiled again. "Quite so!" they said. "We received this year imperial orders, summoning us to the capital!"
"Has the whole family come?" old lady Chia asked.
"Our old mistress, our young master, the two young ladies and the other ladies haven"t come up," the four women explained. "Only our lady has come, together with Miss Tertia."
"Is she engaged to any one?" old lady Chia asked.
"Not yet," rejoined the quartet.
"The two families, that of your senior married lady and that of your lady Secunda are both on most intimate terms with ours," dowager lady Chia smilingly added.
"Yes, they are," replied the four women with a smile. "The letters received each year from our young ladies, a.s.sure us that they"re entirely dependent upon the kindness bestowed upon them, in your worthy mansion, for their well-being."
"What kindness?" old lady Chia exclaimed laughingly. "These two families are really friends of long standing. In addition to this, they"re old relatives. So what we do is our simple bounden duty. What"s more in the favour of your two young ladies is, that they"re not full of their own importance. That"s how it is that we"ve come to be on such close terms."
The four women smiled. "This is mainly due to your venerable ladyship"s excessive humility," they answered.
"Is that young gentleman of yours too with your old mistress?" old lady Chia went on to inquire.
"Yes, he has also come with our old mistress," the four women retorted.
"How old is he?" old lady Chia then asked. "Does he go to school?" she afterwards inquired.
"He"s thirteen this year," the four women said by way of response. "But all through those good looks of his, our old mistress cherishes him so fondly that from his youth up, he has been wayward to the extreme, and that he now daily plays the truant. But our master and mistress as well don"t keep any great check over him."
"Yet, he can"t resemble that young fellow of ours," old lady Chia laughed. "What"s the name of your young gentleman?"
"As our old mistress treats him just like a real precious gem," the quartet explained, "and as his complexion is naturally so white, her ladyship calls him Pao-yu."
"Here"s another one with the name of Pao-yu!" old lady Chia laughingly said to Li Wan.
Li Wan and her companions hastily made a curtsey. "There have been, from old times to the present," they smiled, "very many among contemporaries and persons of different generations as well, who have borne duplicate names."
The four women also smiled. "After the selection of this infant name,"
they proceeded, "we all, both high or low, began to give way to surmises, as we could not make out in what relative"s or friend"s family there was a lad also called by the same name. But as we hadn"t come to the capital for ten years or so, we couldn"t remember."
"That young fellow is my grandson," dowager lady Chia remarked. "Hallo!
some one come here!"
The married women and maids a.s.sented and approached several steps.
"Go into the garden," old lady Chia smilingly said, "and call our Pao-yu here, so that these four housekeeping dames should see how he compares with their own Pao-yu."
The married women, upon hearing her orders, promptly went off. After a while, they entered the room pressing round Pao-yu. The moment the four dames caught sight of him, they speedily rose to their feet. "He has given us such a start!" they exclaimed smilingly. "Had we not come into your worthy mansion, and perchance, met him, elsewhere, we would have taken him for our own Pao-yu, and followed him as far as the capital."
While speaking they came forward and took hold of his hands and a.s.sailed him with questions.
Pao-yu however also put on a smile and inquired after their healths.
"How do his looks compare with those of your young gentleman?" dowager lady Chia asked as she smiled.
"The way the four dames e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed just now," Li Wan and her companions explained, "was sufficient to show how much they resemble in looks."
"How could there ever he such a coincidence?" old lady Chia laughed.
"Yet, the children of wealthy families are so delicately nurtured that unless their faces are so deformed as to make them downright ugly, they"re all equally handsome, as far as general appearances go. So there"s nothing strange in this!"
"As we gaze at his features," the quartet added, with smiling faces, "we find him the very image of him; and from what we gather from your venerable ladyship, he"s also like him in waywardness. But, as far as we can judge, this young gentleman"s disposition is ever so much better than that of ours."
"What makes you think so?" old lady Chia precipitately inquired.
"We saw it as soon as we took hold of the young gentleman"s hands," the four women laughingly rejoined, "and when he spoke to us. Had it been that fellow of ours, he would have simply called us fools. Not to speak of taking his hand in ours, why we daren"t even slightly move any of his things. That"s why, those who wait on him are invariably young girls."
Before the four dames had time to conclude what they had to say, Li Wan and the rest found it so hard to check themselves that with one voice they burst into loud laughter.
Old lady Chia also laughed. "Let"s also send some one now," she said, "to have a look at your Pao-yu. When his hand is taken, he too is sure to make an effort to put up with it. But don"t you know that children of families such as yours and mine are bound, notwithstanding their numerous perverse and strange defects, to return the orthodox civilities, when they come across any strangers. But should they not return the proper civilities, they should, by no manner of means, be suffered to behave with such perverseness. It"s the way that grown-up people doat on them that makes them what they are. And as they can, first and foremost, boast of bewitching good looks and they comport themselves, secondly, towards visitors with all propriety--, in fact, with less faulty deportment than their very seniors--, they manage to win the love and admiration of such as only get a glimpse of them. Hence it is that they"re secretly indulged to a certain degree. But if they don"t show the least regard to any one inside or outside, and so reflect no credit upon their parents, they deserve, with all their handsome looks, to be flogged to death."
These sentiments evoked a smile from the four dames. "Your words venerable lady," they exclaimed, "are quite correct. But though our Pao-yu be wilful and strange in his ways, yet, whenever he meets any visitors, he behaves with courteousness and good manners; so much so, that he"s more pleasing to watch than even grown-up persons. There is no one, therefore, who sees him without falling in love with him. But you"ll say: "why is he then beaten?" You really aren"t aware that at home he has no regard either for precept or for heaven; that he comes out with things that never suggest themselves to the imagination of grown-up people, and that he does everything that takes one by surprise.
The result is that his father and mother are driven to their wits" ends.
But wilfulness is natural to young children. Reckless expenditure is a common characteristic of young men. Antipathy to school is a common feeling with young people. Yet there are ways and means to bring him round. The worse with him is that his disposition is so crotchety and whimsical. Can this ever do?...."
This reply was barely ended when a servant informed them that their mistress had returned. Madame w.a.n.g entered the room, and saluted the women. The four dames paid their obeisance to her. But they had just had sufficient time to pa.s.s a few general observations, when dowager lady Chia bade them go and rest. Madame w.a.n.g then handed the tea in person and withdrew from the apartment. But when the four dames got up to say good-bye, old lady Chia adjourned to Madame w.a.n.g"s quarters. After a chat with her on domestic affairs, she however told the women to go back; so let us put them by without any further allusion to them.
During this while, old lady Chia"s spirits waxed so high, that she told every one and any one she came across that there was another Pao-yu, and that he was, in every respect, the very image of her grandson.
But as each and all bore in mind that there were many inmates among the large households of those officials with official ancestors, called by the same names, that it was an ordinary occurrence for a grandmother to be pa.s.sionately fond of her grandson, and that there was nothing out-of-the-way about it, they treated the matter as of no significance.
Pao-yu alone however was such a hair-brained simpleton that he conjectured that the statements made by the four dames had been intended to flatter his grandmother Chia.
But subsequently he betook himself into the garden to see how Shih Hsiang-yun was getting on.
"Compose your mind now," Shih Hsiang-yun then said to him, "and go on with your larks! Once, you were as lonely as a single fibre, which can"t be woven into thread, and like a single bamboo, which can"t form a grove, but now you"ve found your pair. When you exasperate your parents, and they give you beans, you"ll be able to bolt to Nanking in quest of the other Pao-yu."
"What utter rubbish!" Pao-yu exclaimed. "Do you too believe that there"s another Pao-yu?"
"How is it," Hsiang-yun asked, "that there was some one in the Lieh state called Lin Hsiang-ju, and that during the Han dynasty there lived again another person, whose name was Ssu Ma Hsiang-ju?"
"This matter of names is all well enough," Pao-yu rejoined with a smile.
"But as it happens, his very appearance is the counterpart of mine. Such a thing could never be!"
"How is it," Hsiang-yun inquired, "that when the K"uang people saw Confucius, they fancied it was Yang Huo?"
"Confucius and Yang Huo," Pao-yu smilingly argued, "may have been alike in looks, but they hadn"t the same names. Lin and Ssu were again, notwithstanding their identical names, nothing like each other in appearances. But can it ever be possible that he and I should resemble each other in both respects?"
Hsiang-yun was at a loss what reply to make to his arguments. "You may,"
she consequently remarked smiling, "propound any rubbish you like, I"m not in the humour to enter into any discussion with you. Whether there be one or not is quite immaterial to me. It doesn"t concern me at all."