“That will I do!” said Cuckoo heartily and she laughed as she thought of the fee of good silver on her palm, and she untied her apron from her waist and she said busily, “Now and at once will I go, for the meat is ready except for the moment of cooking and the vegetables are washed.”
But Wang Lung had not pondered the matter sufficiently and it was not to be decided so quickly as this and he called out,
“No, and I have decided nothing. I must think of the matter for some days and I will tell you what I think.”
The women were impatient, Cuckoo for the silver and Lotus because it was a new thing and she would hear something new to amuse her, but Wang Lung went out, saying,
“No, it is my son and I will wait.”
And so he might have waited for many days, thinking of this and that, had not one early morning, the lad, his eldest son, come home in the dawn with his face hot and red with wine drinking, and his breath was fetid and his feet unsteady. Wang Lung heard him stumbling in the court and he ran out to see who it was, and the lad was sick and vomited before him, for he was unaccustomed to more than the pale mild wine they made from their own rice fermented, and he fell and lay on the ground in his vomit like a dog.
Wang Lung was frightened and he called for O-lan, and together they lifted the lad up and O-lan washed him and laid him upon the bed in her own room, and before she was finished with him the lad was asleep and heavy as one dead and could answer nothing to what his father asked.
Then Wang Lung went into the room where the two boys slept together, and the younger was yawning and stretching and tying his books into a square cloth to carry to school, and Wang Lung said to him,
“Was your elder brother not in the bed with you last night?”
And the boy answered unwillingly,
“No.”
There was some fear in his look and Wang Lung, seeing it, cried out at him roughly,
“Where was he gone?” and when the boy would not answer, he took him by the neck and shook him and cried, “Now tell me all, you small dog!”
The boy was frightened at this, and he broke out sobbing and crying and said between his sobs,
“And Elder Brother said I was not to tell you and he said he would pinch me and burn me with a hot needle if I told and if I do not tell he gives me pence.”
And Wang Lung, beside himself at this, shouted out,
“Tell what, you who ought to die?”
And the boy looked about him and said desperately, seeing that his father would choke him if he did not answer,
“He has been away three nights altogether, but what he does I do not know, except that he goes with the son of your uncle, our cousin.”
Wang Lung loosed his hand then from the boy’s neck and he flung him aside and he strode forth into his uncle’s rooms, and there he found his uncle’s son, hot and red of face with wine, even as his own son, but steadier of foot, for the young man was older and accustomed to the ways of men. Wang Lung shouted at him,
“Where have you led my son?”
And the young man sneered at Wang Lung and he said,
“Ah, that son of my cousin’s needs no leading. He can go alone.”
But Wang Lung repeated it and this time he thought to himself that he would kill this son of his uncle’s now, this impudent scampish face, and he cried in a terrible voice,
“Where has my son been this night?”
Then the young man was frightened at the sound of his voice and he answered sullenly and unwillingly, dropping his impudent eyes,
“He was at the house of the whore who lives in the court that once belonged to the great house.”
When Wang Lung heard this he gave a great groan, for the whore was one well known of many men and none went to her except poor and common men, for she was no longer young and she was willing to give much for little. Without stopping for food he went out of his gate and across his fields, and for once he saw nothing of what grew on his land, and noted nothing of how the crop promised, because of the trouble his son had brought to him. He went with his eyes fixed inward, and he went through the gate of the wall about the town, and he went to the house that had been great.
The heavy gates were swung back widely now, and none ever closed them upon their thick iron hinges, for any who would might come and go in these days, and he went in, and the courts and the rooms were filled with common people, who rented the rooms, a family of common people to a room. The place was filthy and the old pines hewed down and those left standing were dying, and the pools in the courts were choked with refuse.
But he saw none of this. He stood in the court of the first house and he called out,
“Where is the woman called Yang, who is a whore?”
There was a woman there who sat on a three-legged stool, sewing at a shoe sole, and she lifted her head and nodded toward a side door opening on the court and she took up her sewing again, as though many times she had been asked this question by men.
Wang Lung went to the door and he beat on it, and a fretful voice answered,
“Now go away, for I am done my business for this night and must sleep, since I work all night.”
But he beat again, and the voice cried out, “Who is it?”
He would not answer, but he beat yet again, for he would go in whether or not, and at last he heard a shuffling and a woman opened the foor, a woman none too young and with a weary face and hanging, thick lips, and coarse white paint on her forehead and red paint she had not washed from her mouth and cheeks, and she looked at him and said sharply,
“Now I cannot before tonight and if you like you may come as early as you will then in the night, but now I must sleep.”
But Wang Lung broke roughly into her talking, for the sight of her sickened him and the thought of his son here he could not bear, and he said,
“It is not for myself—I do not need such as you. It is for my son.”
And he felt suddenly in his throat a thickening of weeping for his son. Then the woman asked,
“Well, and what of your son?”
And Wang Lung answered and his voice trembled,
“He was here last night.”
“There were many sons of men here last night,” replied the Woman, “and I do not know which was yours.”
Then Wang Lung said, beseeching her,
“Think and remember a little slight young lad, tall for his years, but not yet a man, and I did not dream he dared to try a woman.”
And she, remembering, answered,
“Were there two, and was one a young fellow with his turned to the sky at the end and a look in his eye of knowing everything, and his hat over one ear? And the other, as you say, a tall big lad, but eager to be a man!”
And Wang Lung said, “Yes—yes—that is he—that is my son!”
“And what of your son?” said the woman.
Then Wang Lung said earnestly,
“This: if he ever comes again, put him off—say you desire men only—say what you will—but every time you put him off I will give you twice the fee of silver on your palm!”
The woman laughed then and carelessly and she said in sudden good humor,
“And who would not say aye to this, to be paid for not working? And so I say aye also. It is true enough that I desire men and little boys are small pleasure.” And she nodded at Wang Lung as she spoke and leered at him and he was sickened at her coarse face and he said hastily,
“So be it, then.”
He turned quickly and he walked home, and as he walked he spat and spat again to rid him of his sickness at the memory of the woman.
On this day, therefore, he said to Cuckoo,
“Let it be as you said. Go to the grain merchant and arrange the matter. Let the dowry be good but not too great if the girl is suitable and if it can be arranged.”
When he had said this to Cuckoo he went back to the room and he sat beside his sleeping son and he brooded, for he saw how fair and young the boy lay there, and he saw the quiet face, asleep and smooth with its youth. Then when he thought of the weary painted woman and her thick lips, his heart swelled with sickness and anger and he sat there muttering to himself.