The Laundryman's Boy, page 25
Hoi Wing hugged both women, overjoyed to see they had not been injured, although Marsden had a bandage wrapped over his forehead. The uncles thanked them for the food and their help during the riot.
“Well, Harry,” said Professor Marsden, studying the boarded-up window. “It was bedlam here a few nights ago, but it looks as if you’re getting this place back into shape.”
“Thank you.” Hoi Wing shook the man’s hand. “We will open again tomorrow.”
Professor Marsden smiled. “You know what they say—it’s hard to keep a good man down.”
Hoi Wing noticed again how attentive Professor Marsden was to Adele. When the three of them left the laundry, Adele and the professor walked side by side, their hands almost touching.
The laundrymen worked steadily until the late afternoon, when Elder Uncle called a break. They sat down at the just-repaired dinner table to enjoy of the food Martha had brought them. As Hoi Wing lifted a drumstick to his lips, a man began shouting outside. There was a sudden hue of answering cries. A drum pounded, and a woman screamed. As the din of voices rose, there was a roar of explosions like gunfire.
The four laundrymen looked at each other uneasily. Grandfather peered through the boards covering the window. “The street is filling with people!”
“They’re coming to attack us again!” Hoi Wing gasped.
“Not this time!” Elder Uncle raced into the kitchen. In a moment, he was back with a knife and two meat cleavers. He handed one to Second Uncle and the other to Grandfather Foo. “We’ll not let the dead-bastard demons destroy our business again!”
Elder Uncle flung the front door open, with Second Uncle and Grandfather on his heels. It seemed as if the entire population of St. Catharines was outside. Men shouted and threw their hats in the air. Boys lit firecrackers.
Hoi Wing stared as an automobile drove by, blaring its horn. Had everyone gone mad? In the crowd, he thought he recognized some of the rioters from two nights ago, but today’s ruckus seemed celebratory rather than hostile. Across the street, a man kissed a woman before the gates of the livery stable. People were singing “God Save the King.”
“What’s happened?” Hoi Wing asked a man who waved a Union Jack.
“Don’t you know?” he answered. “The King has declared war on Germany! We are at war! Finally, we are at war!”
The euphoria was unabated the next day. A palpable sense of excitement hung in the air, and spontaneous dance parties broke out on the street. “We are going to war!” In no time, two enlistment offices opened—one on Ontario Street in the west end and the other on St. Paul. Within minutes, both had lineups of men and boys that stretched the length of a downtown block. Everyone agreed the Hun had grown too big for his britches. They would put the Kaiser back in his place. Fritz would be taught a lesson.
In the meantime, Elder Uncle reopened the laundry. A few regulars began to drop by, peeking through the boards that had replaced the glass window. How had the laundry fared? Had anyone been injured in the unfortunate “event” that occurred a few days before? Some were genuinely shocked by the actions of their compatriots, although Hoi Wing couldn’t help but wonder where they had been when the laundrymen made their stand against a mob of five hundred.
Others, such as Thick-Moustache Man, were simply ecstatic to learn their clothes had not been destroyed. His shirts were awaiting pickup on a plank Elder Uncle set up beside the cracked counter.
Word soon got around that customers of the Sam Kee Luk Chinese Hand Laundry could retrieve their wash. In the afternoon, Rosie visited to pick up her clothes (bringing a lift to Hoi Wing’s spirits), and later the Master of the Hounds brought in a bag of laundry he needed as a rush job.
“Our first customer after that insanity!” Elder Uncle spilled the man’s garments onto the counter after he had departed. “This is a good omen.”
For most, the riot was soon forgotten. Were the townsfolk shamed by the actions of their neighbours, or had the war caused a sudden, collective amnesia? In the aftermath, no mention was made in regard to reparations for the Chinese businessmen.
When the police conducted their investigation, no one could identify the rioters with certainty. An intrepid few mentioned Braddock’s speech, but it was unclear what had been said or how it might have been taken out of context by a few unruly and hard-drinking visitors. Little more was said about Braddock’s involvement in the riot.
Hoi Wing leaned his elbows on the makeshift counter. The same people who had attacked their home were going about their business as though nothing had happened. In fact, what had happened? The window had been shattered and the mangle badly damaged. The counter was splintered, but the vats, tubs, and water heaters were intact. The brushes, washboards, and braziers were still operable. Even Elder Uncle’s spirit seemed as indefatigable as ever.
Outside, the war celebrations continued. Every so often, a boy would light a firecracker, and the sudden crack like gunfire never failed to make Hoi Wing’s heart skip a beat. He felt empty. He had not passed the examination. He would not go to school in September. He would be stuck in Elder Uncle’s laundry for eternity.
The doorbell jangled. Adele, Martha, and Heather stepped through the door.
“Heather!” Hoi Wing cried. “It’s you! You’re back!” He rushed forward and threw his arms around her. “But why did you go? What happened?”
“I went to see my brother at the farm. After Martha gave you that note, I couldn’t stay here. I couldn’t write that exam.”
“I’ve apologized to Heather for my actions,” said Martha. “She has chosen to forgive me.”
“Harry,” said Adele. “That’s not all the good news. Professor Marsden has agreed to allow you both to sit the test again. He says it’s the least he can do, after what happened to the laundry. You’ll write it in two days!”
At that moment, Elder Uncle came in from the backrooms, and Martha greeted him with a few words in Chinese. Hoi Wing and Heather took advantage of the excitement to slip into the backyard for a few precious moments alone.
“I did not read Martha’s note,” Hoi Wing repeated when they stood outside. It was important that she know he had not cheated.
Heather nodded. “I believe you. I couldn’t stay at Aemon’s farm. He told me to come back here. He said I had an opportunity that was too good to miss.”
Hoi Wing didn’t know what else to say. Things felt awkward between them, and he longed for their easy rapport of the past. Would their friendship find its way back to where it had been? Something told him that relationships never went backwards. Everything in life moved forward, transforming into the new, the untested, and the unforeseen.
He looked into her eyes, wanting very much to kiss her again. The way he had kissed her on Adele’s front porch.
“Farmboy!” Elder Uncle poked his head through the doorway. “Get in here! I need you at the counter.”
Hoi Wing groaned, but Heather only laughed. “In a minute!” he shouted. As the two teens headed inside, he saw the naked stalks of Elder Uncle’s peonies. The blossoms had withered weeks before. Hoi Wing reached into his back pocket and drew out a neatly folded square of cotton. It was the handkerchief on which he had spent so many hours embroidering a bright-red peony. “Here,” he said to Heather. “This is for you.”
The next day, Hoi Wing scrubbed shirts on a washboard. Business was still slow, but picking up. The excitement of the past few days had faded, and his anxiety about Professor Marsden’s examination returned. How would he do tomorrow? He worried about his father’s legacy. Would he pass, or would he repeat Ying the Scholar’s great failure?
In the afternoon, Second Uncle returned from the post office. Today, there was a thick envelope for Hoi Wing, and he instantly recognized his father’s calligraphy. The men took a break to digest their letters from home, and Hoi Wing went into the basement to read Ying the Scholar’s words.
To my son, Hoi Wing the Scholar:
How to tell you the truth? I have held the secret so long that, even today, my pen shakes and ink smears this page. Now I will answer your questions about what really happened when I wrote the Imperial Examinations.
I arrived at the provincial capital after five days’ travel by bullock cart, weak-kneed and nauseated, stumbling past the stinking canals of that coastal city. Tall ships moored at the harbour, and lofan sailors frolicked in the brothels along the wharves. As I wandered the streets, a covered palanquin of mahogany appeared, borne aloft by four slaves.
“Out of the way, Countryboy!” A bearded swordsman in black robes thrust me to the ground. As I sprawled in the dirt, the palanquin passed by, but a beautiful maid peered out through the silken curtains.
“You were wise to say nothing, Stranger.” A man reached out his hand to help me. “That was the daughter of the concubine of the Warlord. His guardsmen have beheaded men for merely gazing upon the girl’s face.” I thanked the man for his wisdom and continued my search for lodgings. Later I learned my purse was gone.
The next morning, I attended at the Hall of Imperial Examinations. Guardsmen handed me a chamber pot, a pitcher of water, and a small chit, stamped with the Emperor’s insignia. The invigilators locked me within a tiny chamber. The examination commenced.
For the next three days and two nights, I read, pondered, analyzed, composed, and wrote. In that windowless chamber, time lost all meaning. My mind grappled with question after question, and my hand grew weary and cramped.
Finally, the examination ended. I left the compound. My plan had been to spend a month at the capital, waiting for the examination results, but with no money, I wandered the streets in a daze.
I came upon a handbill. A wealthy household sought a private tutor. The wages were low but sufficient for room and board on the wharf.
The next day, I went to the House. A servant ushered me into a hall of white marble. At the far wall was an immense five-panelled screen of painted silk.
Adjacent to the screen was a long table. On it were sheets of paper, ink, and brushes. A guardsman in black robes approached. “What is your name, Scholar?”
I gasped inwardly. Although he had no memory of me, it was the swordsman who had thrown me to the ground days before. “I am Ying.”
The guardsman led me to the table. He motioned at a red line across the floor. “Never may you pass this line, if you wish to keep your head.” His hand reached toward the longsword at his side.
I nodded. “But where is my pupil?”
“Here I am, Young Scholar,” came a voice from behind the screens.
I stared at the wall of painted silk. Silhouetted behind was the delicate form of a young woman. My task was to teach her to read and write, but never could my foot cross the red line. Nor was I permitted to see more than her shadow.
So began my time in the House of the wily Warlord. Each day, I attended the marbled chamber, always in the company of the bodyguard. As the days passed, I was struck by the acuity of the young woman’s mind. Words and concepts came easily to her. Poetry and odes followed. Then whispered laughter and chuckles. One day, the configuration of the silk panels was shifted slightly, and sure enough, it was the beautiful girl I had seen in the palanquin!
Holding a finger to her lips, she reached out her hand and caressed my own. I froze. Not twenty paces behind me was the warrior, leaning against the door. His eyelids were shut and his breathing slow. He was asleep!
I began to count the hours to each day’s lesson. Often we passed our time in whispered amusement. A day came when she asked me where I lodged in the capital.
Late that night, there came a knock at my door. When I opened it, a small man stood in my doorway. “Scholar Ying!” he spoke. Suddenly, I laughed in recognition, and the Warlord’s daughter leapt into my arms. She had come in disguise!
Each night thereafter, she came. All her life, she had sported disguises to escape her father’s compound. Fearless and brave, who better than a warlord’s daughter to navigate the cutthroat alleys along the wharves?
Finally, the morning came when I returned to the Examination Hall for my results. My heart almost burst through my chest. I had passed the examination! I collected my Golden Diploma and departed.
But that afternoon, the servant at the Warlord’s house spat at my feet and told me the lessons had been discontinued. I turned away in confusion.
That night, I lay in bed, fingering my pens and inkstones. What should I do? How could I communicate with the Warlord’s daughter? There came a knock at my door. I yanked it open, and the young woman fell into my arms.
“You must escape! My father’s guardsmen hunt you even now!”
“But how can I leave you? Look, I have won my diploma! Come with me and we will seek our fortunes together.”
At that moment, the black-robed guardsman burst through the door, his sword drawn. For long, cruel minutes, he toyed with me, thrusting, pivoting, and riposting, as I gripped my best pen like a dagger.
Finally, he lunged forward, and I fell backwards over a chair. He raised his blade for the coup de grâce.
In that instant, the Warlord’s daughter leapt upon his back. The warrior toppled over me. My arm swung forward, and I plunged my pen into his left eye.
The bodyguard shook. Blood spurted from his punctured eye socket. Then he sagged to the floor. He was dead! My pen had sunk into his brain.
“Your father will hunt me to the ends of the Middle Kingdom,” I said. “You must return to the compound and forget me.”
The Warlord’s daughter weighed the possibilities. “For years, I have sought to escape my father. Perhaps we may yet transform calamity into opportunity.”
“But they will find us wherever we go.”
“Look,” she said. “You and the swordsman are of a size! What if you were to exchange garments?”
Slowly, I understood. “I will wear his clothes. We will flee on his horse. Witnesses will attest that they saw the guardsman spirit you away after killing me.” But then I paused. “What of the body?” I asked. “They will recognize his face.”
A mixture of grit and determination came to her eyes. She lifted the broadsword. “Will you do it, or shall I?”
Thirty minutes later, I stole outside beneath the moon, gripping a sack that held a grisly trophy. I tossed the bag into the canals. The fish and crabs would accomplish all else we desired.
In the morning, I drew on the swordsman’s clothes. Then I clothed the headless man in my scholar’s robes. I spilled my inks and papers to the floor.
I studied the tiny chamber. “Your father is a renowned trickster. Is there anything else we can do to fortify our subterfuge?”
The Warlord’s daughter looked at me. “There is one more ruse we may make, my love. But I do not ask it of you. You must decide yourself.”
For an instant, I didn’t understand. Then I saw her wisdom. Slowly, I unfurled the Golden Diploma, bearing my name. I tucked it within the dead man’s shirt. No scholar in the Middle Kingdom would abandon such a document.
As the sun rose, we mounted the guardsman’s horse and rode through the streets for all to see. All day we rode, until we had left the provincial capital far behind. Then we freed the horse. I divested myself of the guardsman’s robes. The Warlord’s daughter assumed her young man’s guise. Patrols passed, but never did they stop. They sought a mounted warrior and a woman.
In this manner, we walked for weeks. Sometimes we shared a farmer’s wagon with chickens or ducks. There was little to eat, but each night, we huddled in the forests, warm in the heat of our embrace. So it was that I returned to Drink the Waters Deeply with your mother.
Now you know why I returned without my diploma. You need no longer wonder if I cheated or failed at the exam. Perhaps you ask yourself if I regret the sacrifice I made? No. Never. I would do it over and over, exactly the same way.
Now go, my son, and write your own tale.
Your father,
Ying the Scholar
On Friday evening, Hoi Wing was at his desk in the church basement. As always, the air was dank and a little chilly. On the desktop before him was his examination paper—all six sheets—face down. He had his sharpened pencils—Martha had suggested he bring five—a soft eraser, and Second Uncle’s best pen and ink at hand.
At the front of the room, Professor Marsden commanded the big desk. Seated beside him was Martha, and beside her, folded newspaper on his lap, was the Master of the Hounds, once more acting as chief invigilator. Everything was as it had been one week earlier, except tonight Heather was also at her desk, a scant five feet away.
“Students.” Professor Marsden clapped his hands. “You have three hours to complete this exam. The time is 6:59. You may begin the exam in five, four, three, two, one—now! Turn over your examinations and begin the test.”
Out of the corner of Hoi Wing’s eye, he saw Heather flip over her exam and lift her pencil. She began to write furiously and without pause.
Hoi Wing breathed deeply. He imagined the oxygen invigorating his body for the great task at hand. The long months of preparation—all he had done in Adele and Martha’s lessons, in the laundry’s basement, and even back home in his father’s study—were over. Everything that had happened since his arrival in the New World boiled down to this moment.
He shut his eyes and the room seemed less stifling. His desk and chair were a good fit. What did he have to fear? He was the son of Ying the Scholar, was he not? And now he knew the truth of what really happened to his father. Hoi Wing imagined himself back in Drink the Waters Deeply, reviewing the day’s lessons with the man. In the background, he could almost hear his mother’s humming.
The basement classroom thrummed with possibility. Hoi Wing opened his eyes. Beneath his fingertips, the exam paper was crisp and luminescent. He rubbed his hands briskly and lifted his pencil. He touched its tip to his tongue. Then he turned over his examination paper.
25
From a distance, Hoi Wing could hear the strains of pipes and the beating of drums. A ripple of anticipation coursed through the crowd. “The parade is coming, Mama!” a little boy breathed. “They’re coming!”
