Chapter 9

THE MARRIAGE TIE

In the province of Kiangsi on the banks of the River Kan, which flows almost due north to the Poyang lake and so into the Yangtsekiang, is situate the town of Kanchow, on the outskirts of which dwelt a merchant named Chin Pao-ting with his wife and infant son.

After the custom of all Chinese merchants, Mr Chin had a shop which, although used for retail purposes, was in reality the office of his not inconsiderable wholesale business. Mr Chin had some time previous to this date, the early spring of 1892, engaged a young man of the locality named Wang Foo-lin, as accountant and confidential clerk, and he had proved himself so intelligent and useful that not only did Chin regard him with feelings of friendship but even conceived the idea of subsequently taking him into partnership. What Chin's particular business was I do not know, beyond the fact that each year it took him away from home for several weeks, and sometimes months at a time, when he travelled to other provinces. This annual voyage was now at hand. Four boats were filled with various kinds of merchandise, while a fifth and smaller craft was selected to convey Chin and his assistant, who now accompanied his master for the first time. This boat was fairly comfortable from a Chinese point of view, having benches on either side of the cabin and a kind of platform at the back, with a small, low table thereon bearing the customary incense-burner, containing fragrant joss-sticks, and also on this occasion a small _joss_ or gilt image of Buddha, which Chin always took with him on his wanderings.

All preparations having been slowly completed the day for departure arrived, and Chin, with much bowing and ceremonial posturing, having wished his wife and little son adieu, embarked with Wang, taking the equivalent of five thousand dollars[2] in sycee shoes and gold-dust, and amidst valedictory fusillades of fire-crackers, as well as a beating of gongs, the flotilla cast off and sailed away down river.

Nothing of particular interest occurred during the voyage of two hundred miles to the Poyang lake beyond usual delays caused by the dried-up condition at that season of all waterways connected with China's mighty river.

The sources of the Yangtse are to be found in the mountain ranges of Thibet, and as during winter and early spring the deep snows of those lofty regions lie icebound and the great river is fed only by local rains, its waters dwindle in volume until they find a level forty feet below that of summer and autumn, when torrid heat and torrential rains thaw the snows in Central Asia and fill the river-bed with a thick, brown current which, after overflowing into and filling all lakes, tributaries and unprotected lowlands in the Yangtse valley, sweeps eastwards to the ocean, a foaming torrent of irresistible force.

After about twenty days of incessant toil in tracking, poling and yulowing along the tortuous and mud-bound channel of the Kan, where sailing, owing to the low water and consequent towering banks which shut off the wind, was seldom possible, the small fleet emerged on the Poyang lake. Not, however, the magnificent sheet of water which is found there in summer, but the lake as it is in winter, contracted to one tenth of its maximum size, and little more than a wide and sluggish river flanked by boundless mud tracts swarming with snipe and wildfowl. Another few days' sailing, for the breeze could now be felt across the wide marshland, and Hukow (mouth of the lake) was reached, where the merchandise in the four small lake boats was transferred to a large and stately junk destined to carry it far up-river towards the West, while good accommodation was found on board both for Chin and his assistant. As soon as the transhipment of cargo had been completed, and Chin had written a letter for transmission to his wife by the boats returning to Kanchow, sail was made on the junk, and passing out of the tranquil waters of the lake she was seen to shape an up-river course reefed close before a rising gale, until lost to sight in the rain and gathering darkness.

The empty boats arrived in due course at Kanchow, when the letter was faithfully delivered, and this being the last communication that would be received from her husband prior to his return, Mrs Chin resigned herself to many weeks of dreary loneliness.

Weeks lengthened into months, and the waiting woman began to feel anxious as to the well-being of her lord.

The stifling, burning summer came and went, and still there was neither sign nor tidings of the absent one.

Inquiries made of passing junks, to the crews of many of which Chin was well-known, ever elicited the invariable reply that nothing had been seen or heard of him.

Autumn and winter still brought no tidings, and the poor, saddened woman yielded to the conviction that some disaster had overtaken her husband and that she would see him no more.

Early Chinese marriages are almost invariably arranged by the parents, the young folks, even if old enough, having no voice in the matter. Later on, plurality of wives, though far from universal, is also quite common and of good repute.

The lower orders generally have only one wife, not being able to afford more, although as soon as a man commences to prosper and rise in the social scale his first thought is to procure by contract or by purchase an additional helpmeet, who, however, ranks far below the _first_ or _No. 1_ wife. Similarly _No. 2_ ranks before _No. 3_, and so on. Four or five wives is a common number in well-to-do households, though one old friend of mine, since dead, had taken to himself sixteen.

Husbands regard the marriage tie as binding on them chiefly with regard to the material well-being of the family, whereas the honour of the family rests on the wife's steadfastness in maintaining sacred the nuptial vow, any detected laxity in this respect being visited on her with remorseless punishment both by her libidinous husband and by the whole of his clan. Widows seldom marry again, it being the duty and pride of a virtuous woman to remain faithful to the memory of her dead husband. Throughout the whole length and breadth of China memorial arches to widows who have been faithful to their troth till death are to be seen in almost every village.

Mrs Chin may have been, and probably was, attached to her husband with that fanatical single-mindedness which belongs to women of the East. She may have considered it her bounden duty only. Whether love or duty furnished the motive I cannot tell, but after making all possible inquiries to no purpose she determined to set out herself and search for traces of the missing one. The shop and her belongings were sold to provide money for the way, and the poor woman, forsaking all and carrying the child strapped to her shoulders, turned with a bitter heart from her former prosperous home to face the world on her well-nigh hopeless quest. Of her wanderings I could get no record, and she would probably, with Oriental inscrutability, have refused to even talk about them, but wherever else they may have led her, in the bitter winter of 1893 she was twenty miles up-river from Hukow at the open port of Kiukiang and alone, her child having perished by the way, begging food and prosecuting her inquiries. Chance led her to shelter for a night in the ruined but beautiful pagoda which stands high above the river on the cliff outside the city wall. To the old Buddhist hermit in possession she told her oft-repeated tale, only once again to receive the usual negative reply.

In the morning, however, as she was moving off on her daily trudge, the hermit appeared, and after the customary Buddhistic salutation, "O me tor foo,"[3] had been exchanged, he remarked that during the night it recurred to him that about eighteen moons had passed since he found the dead body of a man cast up naked on the opposite beach, and that following the rule of his order for acquiring merit he had carefully and reverently buried it.

The poor wanderer seemed at last to see some faint possibility of reward for her dreary pilgrimage. She followed the hermit to the river side, where his small and leaky sampan was drawn up on the mud. After considerable effort the boat was launched by the feeble pair, and taking her place in it she was rowed by the old man across the heaving river, which is here more than a mile in width, to the opposite beach, where a little above high-water mark the grave was found. Scraping aside the loose sand and rubble, and raising the unfastened lid of the rough coffin, the mouldering skeleton was unrecognisable. Quick as thought the woman thrust her fingers into the crumbling mass and raised an arm of the dead, on which was seen to be the half of a jade bracelet. Immediately baring her own arm to the hermit's gaze she displayed on it the other half of the same jewel.

A common Chinese practice is for man and wife to have one jade bangle split so as to form two bangles, and to wear one each, with much the same idea as our Mizpah rings.

The woman looked as if turned to stone. She moved not a muscle, but with livid face and hard, glassy eyes kept her position in the open grave, leaning on one hand across the coffin and grasping with her other the mouldering arm of the corpse, so that the two bangles were laid side by side.

Silently and reverently the old hermit stole away, leaving the living with the dead, and rowed back across the river to his home without once turning his eyes, for curiosity he had none, but in its place the Oriental's deep and mystic knowledge of life and death.

In the lonely grave amongst the rank grass and sand mounds the woman stayed, oblivious of the cold and soaking rain. For a long time she rested absolutely motionless as if also dead. Then a few upward movements of the head told of her silent agony. By-and-by a low, tremulous moan broke from her ashen lips. Almost inaudible at first, her sobs increased until her whole frame was convulsed. She called upon her husband, she poured blessings on his name, she craved blessings from his spirit. Long and loud, with all her soul, with all her strength and in most absolute sincerity, she bewailed her dead, as is the custom in the East, until exhaustion overpowered her and she slept.

It was almost dark when the hermit returned and thus found the faithful woman, sodden by the rain, her hair unbound and trailing in the sand. Gently rousing her and speaking soothing words he held out his humble offering of two little bowls containing rice and samshu, some sticks of incense and a few tiny candles. These the poor woman took, but without a sign, for her gratitude was too deep to show, and reverently placed the bowls, the lighted candles and smouldering incense-sticks in position round the grave.

Then, having kowtowed many times before the corpse, the lid of the coffin was replaced and covered with a few inches of sand, after which she turned as one in a trance and followed the hermit to his boat. Her husband was dead, she had bewailed him and burnt incense at his grave, and what further could this poor, broken woman do?

What her intentions then were I do not know, but a few days later, when returning at dusk from Kiukiang to the pagoda, she was stopped in a lonely alley outside the western gate by a man who said, "Your husband was murdered eighteen moons ago by Wang Foo-lin, who is now living in Hankow." It was too dark to see the man's face and the voice she did not know, but it was probably one of the sailors of the missing junk who had some grievance to avenge. From the effect these words had on the woman's fallen strength it might have been a message from the gods pointing afresh the path of duty. She sought her friend the hermit and related to him what had befallen her, and explained that she would now go to Hankow in quest of the murderer, for that her husband's spirit could never rest until his assassin had been brought to justice.

How she travelled the one hundred and twenty miles from Kiukiang to Hankow I do not know, but it is certain that she appeared in the latter place begging from house to house, and after a time recognised Wang Foo-lin trading under an assumed name in a shop of considerable size. Wang on his part did not recognise the feeble and unkempt old beggar-woman, so changed was she from the prosperous Mrs Chin, and took but little notice of this one amongst many tens of other mendicants, so that she was able to stand for some time at the shop door without attracting undue attention, when she carefully noted the contents of the store, and amongst other things recognised the gilt joss which her husband had taken with him. Her next step was to procure an audience of the local magistrate, and to do this she was obliged to expend a considerable part of her remaining cash in bribing the yamen underlings ere they would consent to lay her case before the official or give her admittance to his court. After waiting many days the audience was granted, and kneeling on the filthy floor before the judgment seat she unfolded her story, accusing Wang Foo-lin of the murder of her husband. The magistrate listened to her tale, but at the end said, "You accuse this man of murder but produce no evidence in support of your statements, and your bare word is not sufficient. If you can bring forward any actual proof I will then take action." Mrs Chin replied that in Wang's shop she had seen a gilt image of Buddha which her husband had taken with him on his ill-fated voyage. That many years ago at Kanchow she had knocked over and broken the nose off this same image, and that to repair the damage she had melted down one of her gold earrings and replaced the nose. If, therefore, it were found that this gilt joss had a gold nose then the magistrate would know her tale was true. The official replied that he would accept this as sufficient evidence and would at once put it to the test. Sending his runners with Mrs Chin to the shop, Wang was arrested, and together with the gilt joss taken to the yamen, where it was quickly found that the image actually had a gold nose as declared by the old woman.

Knowing his case to be hopeless, and yielding to the racking torture which was quickly applied, the guilty wretch made a full confession of his crime. As a boy he had often heard of Chin Pao-ting's annual voyages to the West, while local gossip had so enlarged upon the merchant's wealth that the junk bearing him and his merchandise might well be a veritable treasure ship, so that when still a youth Wang had journeyed to Kiukiang with the deliberate intention of forming a scheme to waylay the annual expedition and thus acquire riches at a single stroke. As attendant in an opium den near the quay, he had come in contact with many low and desperate characters, amongst whom was the lowdah of a certain junk which plied for hire between the Poyang lake and the provinces of the West.

Gradually an intimacy sprang up between these two, until at length the diabolical plot was hatched of murdering Chin and levanting with his goods. Wang now returned to Kanchow, and, as we have seen, not only contrived to enter the service of Chin Pao-ting but also to gain his esteem and confidence.

For the next annual voyage a large river-junk to await the merchant at Hukow was, through Wang's astuteness, chartered on exceptionally favourable terms.

This junk, needless to say, was that of Wang's confederate, and once on board the unhappy traveller was a doomed man. On the first night of the voyage he was pounced on in his sleep, stunned with a blow and thrown overboard. At Kiukiang, where the vessel stopped, the lowdah and his men went ashore after receiving the gold dust and sycee shoes as their share of the plunder, while Wang, taking the junk and cargo as his portion, shipped a fresh crew and sailed on to Hankow, where he set up in business with the proceeds of his ill-gotten gains.

His examination finished and released from torture, Wang was led away in a swooning condition to a foul dungeon, where his silk garments were quickly stripped off and replaced by crimson clothes, stiff with clotted human blood and thick with vermin, but such as criminals condemned to execution are compelled to wear. By an iron ring mercilessly forced through his flesh and welded round his collar-bone he was chained to a stone pillar, and so left to await his doom or to rot on the reeking floor.

After prolonged deliberations amongst the authorities, it was decided that the prisoner should be beheaded at Kiukiang, that being the centre of the district in which his crime was committed.

Still clad in crimson clothes, the poor wretch was dragged by the chain from his cell, too emaciated and broken to even stand. His hands and feet were bound together with sharp cords and a bamboo pole thrust between them, and in such manner he was carried through the streets by two coolies, escorted by a few runners, to be thrown like a bundle of old clothes into the hold of a police junk, which bore him more dead than alive on his last voyage.

Owing to information extracted from Wang two further arrests were made of members of the junk's crew, but the lowdah and one other succeeded in making good their escape.

* * * * *

It was now summer, and the view looking south from Kiukiang city wall was peaceful and grand. In the distance rose the majestic Lushan range, the peaks of which were illumined by the setting sun. Nearer, the low hills, clothed with firs and azaleas, rolled as a carpet to the lake, which lay between them and the city ramparts. A narrow causeway from the city to the hills, cut the lake in two. At the far end of the causeway was a plot of level ground, strewn with potsherds and heaps of refuse. Here, in contrast to its usual solitude, a dense crowd had collected in evident anticipation of some interesting event. Presently two or three horsemen and a motley gang of soldiers emerged from the city and proceeded quickly along the causeway. Closely following were coolies carrying three red burdens, on bamboo poles, and these in turn were followed by more soldiers and a few officials in sedan chairs. It was an execution. The hurrying cavalcade was swallowed up in the dense crowd which happily served as a curtain to hide this ghastly scene of human wrath from Nature's smiling landscape. Half-an-hour later the official procession returned as quickly as it went, and gradually the crowd, sauntering by the water's edge, laughing, joking and making merry of the gruesome spectacle just witnessed, filtered back through the city gates.

Next morning three wooden baskets on long poles were exposed from the top of an archway, and in each basket was a human head. Wang and his companions had met their just rewards.

At Kanchow a pylow, or memorial arch, will eventually be erected in honour of the widow of Chin Pao-ting, so that to posterity may be preserved a just record of her virtuous devotion.

FOOTNOTES:

[2] Then about L600.

[3] Untranslatable. "Peace be with you," or meaning to that effect.