Never in all his life had Yuan felt so tender as he now did to his father. He forgot all the years passed and he seemed to see his father always as he was now with this simple childish heart, and he soothed him over and over, saying, “I will fetch it back somehow, my father — I will send a sum of silver and buy it back.”
This Yuan knew he could not do, but he doubted if tomorrow the old man could live to think of his sword and so he promised anything to soothe him.
Yet what could be done after soothing? The old man slept at last, comforted a little, and Yuan sat beside him and the trusty man brought him a little food, stealing quietly in and out, and speechless lest he wake his master’s light sick sleeping. Silently Yuan sat there, and so he sat while his old father slept, and at last he laid his head down upon the table by him and slept a little too.
But as night drew near, Yuan awoke and he ached in every bone so that he must rise, and he did, and he went noiselessly away into the other room and there the old trusty man was, who, weeping, told him again the tale he already knew. Then the old man added this, “We must somehow leave this earthen house, because the farmers hereabouts are full of hatred, and they know how helpless my old master is and they would have fallen on us, I am sure, little general, if you had not come. Seeing you come, young and strong, they will hold off awhile perhaps—”
Then the old tenant put in his word, and he said doubtfully, looking at Yuan, “But I wish you had a garment not foreign, young lord, for the country folk hate these young new men so much these days because in spite of all their promises of better times rains are come and there will be certain floods, and if they see your foreign clothes such as the others wear—” He paused and went away and came back with his own best robe of blue cotton cloth, not patched more than once or twice, and he said coaxingly, “Wear this to save us, sir, and I have some shoes, too, and then if you are seen—”
So Yuan put on the robe, willing if it made more safety, for he knew the wounded Tiger could not be taken anywhere now, but must die where he had fallen, though he did not say so, knowing the old trusty man could never bear to hear the word death.
Two days Yuan stayed beside his father waiting, and still the old Tiger did not die, and while he waited Yuan wondered if the lady would come or not. Perhaps she would not, since she had the child to care for whom she loved so well.
But she did come. At the end of the afternoon of the second day Yuan sat beside his father, who lay now as though he slept continually unless he were forced to eat or move. The pallor had grown darker, and from his poisoned dying flesh a faint stench passed off into the air of the room. Outside, the early spring drew on, but Yuan had not once gone out to see sky or earth. He was mindful of what the old men said, that he was hated, and he would not stir that hatred now, for the Tiger’s sake, that at least he might die in peace in this old house.
So he sat beside the bed and thought of many things, and most of all how strange his life was and how confused and how there was not one known hope to which to hold. These elders, in their times, they were clear and simple — money, war, pleasure — these were good and worth giving all one’s life for. And some few gave all for gods, as his old aunt did, or as that old foreign pair across the sea did. Everywhere the old were the same, simple as children, understanding nothing. But the young, his own kind, how confused they were — how little satisfied by the old gods and gains! For a moment he remembered the woman Mary and wondered what her life was, — perhaps like his; perhaps marked for no clear great goal. … Out of all he knew there was only Mei-ling who put her hand surely to a certain thing she knew she wanted to do. If he could have married Mei-ling …
Then across this useless thinking he heard a voice and it was the lady’s. She was come! He rose quickly and went out, greatly cheered to hear her. More than he knew he had hoped for her coming. And there she was — and by her, with her, there was Mei-ling!
Now Yuan had never once thought or hoped for this and he was so astonished, he could only look at Mei-ling and stammer forth, “I thought — Who is with the child?”
And Mei-ling answered in her tranquil, sure way, “I told Ai-lan for once she must come and see to him, and the fates helped, because she has had a great quarrel with her husband over some woman she says he looked at too often, and so it suited her to come home for a few days. Where is your father?”
“Let us go to him at once,” said the lady. “Yuan, I brought Mei-ling, thinking she would know by her skill how he did.” Then Yuan made no delay, but he took them in and there they three stood beside the Tiger’s bedside.
Now whether it was the noise of talking or whether it was the sound of women’s voices to which he was not used, or what it was, the old Tiger came for a passing moment out of his stupor, and seeing his heavy eyes open on her the lady said gently, “My lord, do you remember me?” And the old Tiger answered, “Aye, I do—” and drowsed again, so they could not be sure whether he spoke the truth or not. But soon he opened his eyes once more and now he stared at Mei-ling, and he said, dreamily, “My daughter—”
At this Yuan would have spoken who she was, but Mei-ling stopped him, saying pityingly, “Let him call me daughter. He is very near the last breath now. Do not disturb him—”
So Yuan stayed silent after his father’s glance wavered again to him because even though he knew the Tiger did not know clearly what he said, it was sweet to hear him call Mei-ling by that name,
There they three stood, united somehow, waiting, but the old Tiger sank deeper into his sleep.
That night Yuan took counsel with the lady and with Mei-ling and together they planned what must be done. Mei-ling said gravely, “He will not live through this night, if I see rightly. It is a wonder he has lived these three days — he has a stout old heart, but it is not stout enough for all he has had to bear, to know himself defeated. Besides, the poison from his wounded hands has gone into his blood and made it fevered. I marked it when I washed and dressed his hands.”
For while the Tiger slept his half-dead sleep Mei-ling in the skilfulest fashion had cleansed and eased the old man’s torn flesh, and Yuan stood by humbly watching her, and all the while he watched he could not but ask himself if this gentle tender creature was that same angry woman who had cried she hated him. About the rude old house she moved as naturally as though she lived always in it, and from its poverty she found somehow the things she needed for her ministration, such things as Yuan would not have dreamed could be so used, — straw she tied into a mat and slipped under the dying man so he could lie more easily upon the boards, and a brick she took up from the edge of the small dried pool and heated in the hot ashes of the earthen oven and put to his chilling feet, and she made a millet gruel delicately and fed it to him and though he never spoke he did not moan so much as he had. Then Yuan, while he blamed himself because he had not done these things himself, knew humbly that he could not do them. Her strong narrow hands could stir about so gently that they seemed not to move the great old fleshless frame, and yet they eased it.
Now when she spoke he listened, trusting all she said, and they planned, and the lady listened when the old trusty man said they must go away as soon as the death was over, because ill-will gathered blacker every day about them. And the old tenant put his voice to a whisper and he said, “It is true, for today I went about and heard and everywhere there was muttering because they said the young lord was come back to claim the land. It is better for you to go away again, and wait until these evil times are over. I and this old harelip will stay here and we will pretend we are with them, and secretly we will be for you, young lord. For it is evil to break the law of the land. The gods will not forgive us if we use such lawless means — the gods in the earth, they know the rightful owners—”