On the east side stood a sleeping divan. On a movable bed was hung a leek-green gauze curtain, ornamented with double embroideries, representing flowers, plants and insects. Pan Erh ran up to have a look.

"This is a green-cicada," he shouted; "this a gra.s.shopper!"

But old goody Liu promptly gave him a slap. "You mean scamp!" she cried.

"What an awful rumpus you're kicking up! I simply brought you along with me to look at things; and lo, you put on airs;" and she beat Pan Erh until he burst out crying. It was only after every one quickly combined in using their efforts to solace him that he at length desisted.

Old lady Chia then looked through the gauze cas.e.m.e.nt into the back court for some time. "The dryandra trees by the eaves of the covered pa.s.sage are growing all right," she remarked. "The only thing is that their foliage is rather spa.r.s.e."

But while she pa.s.sed this remark, a sudden gust of wind swept by, and faintly on her ear fell the strains of music. "In whose house is there a wedding?" old lady Chia inquired. "This place must be very near the street!"

"How could one hear what's going on in the street?" Madame w.a.n.g and the others smiled. "It's our twelve girls practising on their wind and string instruments!"

"As they're practising," dowager lady Chia eagerly cried, smilingly, "why not ask them to come in here and practise? They'll be able to have a stroll also, while we, on our part, will derive some enjoyment."

Upon hearing this suggestion, lady Feng immediately directed a servant to go out and call them in. She further issued orders to bring a table and spread a red cover over it.

"Let it be put," old lady Chia chimed in, "in the water-pavilion of the Lotus Fragrance Arbour, for (the music) will borrow the ripple of the stream and sound ever so much more pleasant to the ear. We can by and bye drink our wine in the Cho Chin Hall; we'll thus have ample room, and be able to listen from close!"

Every one admitted that the spot was well adapted. Dowager lady Chia turned herself towards Mrs. Hsueh. "Let's get ahead!" she laughed. "The young ladies don't like any one to come in here, for fear lest their quarters should get contaminated; so don't let us show ourselves disregardful of their wishes! The right thing would be to go and have our wine aboard one of those boats!"

As she spoke, one and all rose to their feet. They were making their way out when T'an Ch'un interposed. "What's this that you're saying?" she smiled. "Please do seat yourselves, venerable senior, and you, Mrs.

Hsueh, and Madame w.a.n.g! You can't be going yet?"

"These three girls of mine are really nice! There are only two mistresses that are simply dreadful." Dowager lady Chia said smilingly.

"When we get drunk shortly, we'll go and sit in their rooms and have a lark!"

These words evoked laughter from every one. In a body they quitted the place. But they had not proceeded far before they reached the bank covered with aquatic plants, to which place the boat-women, who had been brought from Ku Su, had already punted two crab-wood boats. Into one of these boats, they helped old lady Chia, Madame w.a.n.g, Mrs. Hsueh, old goody Liu, Yuan Yang, and Yu Ch'uan-Erh. Last in order Li Wan followed on board. But lady Feng too stepped in, and standing up on the bow, she insisted upon punting.

Dowager lady Chia, however, remonstrated from her seat in the bottom of the boat. "This isn't a joke," she cried, "we're not on the river, it's true, but there are some very deep places about, so be quick and come in. Do it for my sake."

"What's there to be afraid of?" lady Feng laughed. "Compose your mind, worthy ancestor."

Saying this, the boat was pushed off with one shove. When it reached the middle of the lake, lady Feng became nervous, for the craft was small and the occupants many, and hastily handing the pole to a boatwoman, she squatted down at last.

Ying Ch'un, her sisters, their cousins, as well as Pao-yu subsequently got on board the second boat, and followed in their track; while the rest of the company, consisting of old nurses and a bevy of waiting-maids, kept pace with them along the bank of the stream.

"All these broken lotus leaves are dreadful!" Pao-yu shouted. "Why don't you yet tell the servants to pull them off?"

"When was this garden left quiet during all the days of this year?"

Pao-ch'ai smiled. "Why, people have come, day after day, to visit it, so was there ever any time to tell the servants to come and clean it?"

"I have the greatest abhorrence," Lin Tai-yu chimed in, "for Li I's poetical works, but there's only this line in them which I like:

"'Leave the dry lotus leaves so as to hear the patter of the rain.'

"and here you people deliberately mean again not to leave the dry lotus stay where they are."

"This is indeed a fine line!" Pao-yu exclaimed. "We mustn't hereafter let them pull them away!"

While this conversation continued, they reached the shoaly inlet under the flower-laden beech. They felt a coolness from the shady overgrowth penetrate their very bones. The decaying vegetation and the withered aquatic chestnut plants on the sand-bank enhanced, to a greater degree, the beauty of the autumn scenery.

Dowager lady Chia at this point observed some spotless rooms on the bank, so spick and so span. "Are not these Miss Hsueh's quarters," she asked. "Eh?"

"Yes, they are!" everybody answered.

Old lady Chia promptly bade them go alongside, and wending their way up the marble steps, which seemed to lead to the clouds, they in a body entered the Heng Wu court. Here they felt a peculiar perfume come wafting into their nostrils, for the colder the season got the greener grew that strange vegetation, and those fairy-like creepers. The various plants were laden with seeds, which closely resembled red coral beans, as they drooped in lovely cl.u.s.ters.

The house, as soon as they put their foot into it, presented the aspect of a snow cave. There was a total absence of every object of ornament.

On the table figured merely an earthenware vase, in which were placed several chrysanthemums. A few books and teacups were also conspicuous, but no further knicknacks. On the bed was suspended a green gauze curtain, and of equally extreme plainness were the coverlets and mattresses belonging to it.

"This child," dowager lady Chia sighed, "is too simple! If you've got nothing to lay about, why not ask your aunt for a few articles? I would never raise any objection. I never thought about them. Your things, of course, have been left at home, and have not been brought over."

So saying, she told Yuan Yang to go and fetch several bric-a-brac. She next went on to call lady Feng to task.

"She herself wouldn't have them," (lady Feng) rejoined. "We really sent over a few, but she refused every one of them and returned them."

"In her home also," smiled Mrs. Hsueh, "she does not go in very much for such sort of things."

Old lady Chia nodded her head. "It will never do!" she added. "It does, it's true, save trouble; but were some relative to come on a visit, she'll find things in an impossible way. In the second place, such simplicity in the apartments of young ladies of tender age is quite unpropitious! Why, if you young people go on in this way, we old fogies should go further and live in stables! You've all heard what is said in those books and plays about the dreadful luxury, with which young ladies' quarters are got up. And though these girls of ours could not presume to place themselves on the same footing as those young ladies, they shouldn't nevertheless exceed too much the bounds of what const.i.tutes the right thing. If they have any objects ready at hand, why shouldn't they lay them out? And if they have any strong predilection for simplicity, a few things less will do quite as well. I've always had the greatest knack for t.i.tifying a room, but being an old woman now I haven't the ease and inclination to attend to such things! These girls are, however, learning how to do things very nicely. I was afraid that there would be an appearance of vulgarity in what they did, and that, even had they anything worth having, they'd so place them about as to spoil them; but from what I can see there's nothing vulgar about them.

But let me now put things right for you, and I'll wager that everything will look grand as well as plain. I've got a couple of my own knicknacks, which I've managed to keep to this day, by not allowing Pao-yu to get a glimpse of them; for had he ever seen them, they too would have long ago disappeared!" Continuing, she called Yuan Yang.

"Fetch that marble pot with scenery on it," she said to her; "that gauze screen, and that tripod of transparent stone with black streaks, which you'll find in there, and lay out all three on this table. They'll be ample! Bring likewise those ink pictures and white silk curtains, and change these curtains."

Yuan Yang expressed her obedience. "All these articles have been put away in the eastern loft," she smiled. "In what boxes they've been put, I couldn't tell; I must therefore go and find them quietly and if I bring them over to-morrow, it will be time enough."

"To-morrow or the day after will do very well; but don't forget, that's all," dowager lady Chia urged.

While conversing, they sat for a while. Presently, they left the rooms and repaired straightway into the Cho Chin hall. Wen Kuan and the other girls came up and paid their obeisance. They next inquired what songs they were to practise.

"You'd better choose a few pieces to rehea.r.s.e out of those you know best," old lady Chia rejoined.

Wen Kuan and her companions then withdrew and betook themselves to the Lotus Fragrance Pavilion. But we will leave them there without further allusion to them.

During this while, lady Feng had already, with the help of servants, got everything in perfect order. On the left and right of the side of honour were placed two divans. These divans were completely covered with embroidered covers and fine variegated mats. In front of each divan stood two lacquer teapoys, inlaid, some with designs of crab-apple flowers; others of plum blossom, some of lotus leaves, others of sun-flowers. Some of these teapoys were square, others round. Their shapes were all different. On each was placed a set consisting of a stove and a bottle, also a box with part.i.tions. The two divans and four teapoys, in the place of honour, were used by dowager lady Chia and Mrs.

Hsueh. The chair and two teapoys in the next best place, by Madame w.a.n.g.

The rest of the inmates had, all alike, a chair and a teapoy. On the east side sat old goody Liu. Below old goody Liu came Madame w.a.n.g. On the west was seated Shih Hsiang-yun. The second place was occupied by Pao-ch'ai; the third by Tai-yu; the fourth by Ying Ch'un. T'an Ch'un and Hsi Ch'un filled the lower seats, in their proper order; Pao-yu sat in the last place. The two teapoys a.s.signed to Li Wan and lady Feng stood within the third line of railings, and beyond the second row of gauze frames. The pattern of the part.i.tion-boxes corresponded likewise with the pattern on the teapoys. Each inmate had a black decanter, with silver, inlaid in foreign designs; as well as an ornamented, enamelled cup.

After they had all occupied the seats a.s.signed to them, dowager lady Chia took the initiative and smilingly suggested: "Let's begin by drinking a couple of cups of wine. But we should also have a game of forfeits to-day, we'll have plenty of fun then."

"You, venerable senior, must certainly have a good wine order to impose," Mrs. Hsueh laughingly observed, "but how could we ever comply with it? But if your aim be to intoxicate us, why, we'll all straightway drink one or two cups more than is good for us and finish!"

"Here's Mrs. Hsueh beginning to be modest again to-day!" old lady Chia smiled. "But I expect it's because she looks down upon me as being an old hag!"

"It isn't modesty!" Mrs. Hsueh replied smiling. "It's all a dread lest I shouldn't be able to observe the order and thus incur ridicule."

"If you don't give the right answer," Madame w.a.n.g promptly interposed with a smile, "you'll only have to drink a cup or two more of wine, and should we get drunk, we can go to sleep; and who'll, pray laugh at us?"

Mrs. Hsueh nodded her head. "I'll agree to the order," she laughed, "but, dear senior, you must, after all, do the right thing and have a cup of wine to start it."

"This is quite natural!" old lady Chia answered laughingly; and with these words, she forthwith emptied a cup.