Gold Mountain Blues - Ling Zhang [7]
“No one’s been in here for years. Of course we haven’t got a key” was the reply. “Anyway now the owner’s turned up, she can break the lock herself.”
Ng went back to the track, picked up a sharp stone and handed it to Amy. The lock was very old and broke after a couple of blows, but the door was sturdier and juddered before finally opening a crack. With a grating cry, a sooty-black bird flew out, its wings nearly grazing Amy’s head. Amy’s knees gave way and she sat down on the ground, clasping her hands tightly over her chest, her heart thudding.
The village cadre looked uneasy. “The rites … has she performed the ancestral rites yet?” he whispered to Auyung.
“Whatever’s the matter?” Auyung said. “Her ancestors have had a long wait for her to get here. They’ve scarcely had time to rejoice, let alone be offended. The rites can wait until tomorrow, she hasn’t been to the graves yet.”
“I’m off outside for a smoke,” said the cadre, clearly alarmed. And he waited at the entrance as Auyung led the way into the house.
As she stepped over the threshold, Amy heard the scrunching of dirt under her feet. The glass in the windows was broken and the evening sunshine streamed in, turning the dust particles to gold. Amy stood still. Gradually she began to make out the interior; it contained no furniture except a water barrel with a large crack down the side.
“The kitchen and the servants’ rooms were on this level,” explained Auyung, “the Fongs’ rooms and bedrooms were all on the floors above.”
They made their way over to the stairs.
Its treads had collapsed in so many places that the staircase looked like a ribcage with the intestines rotted away. Auyung and Amy cautiously made their way up, testing each step as they went, until they finally arrived at the second floor. Against the wall facing them was a long wooden table, its paintwork faded. Two round objects stood on it. Amy took a closer look and realized they were copper incense burners, their elegant shapes ravaged by the thick layers of verdigris which covered them. In a small alcove in the wall stood a statue of Guan Yam, the Buddhist goddess of mercy. Her head and shoulders had been lopped off, and only the fingers holding the lotus flower remained as a reminder of her compassion. The paint had worn off the characters engraved above the statue and only a few could be made out:
Candle … create … flower
… incense … out … peaceful home
Under the statue there was a wooden memorial tablet with no paint left on it at all. Rainwater had leaked in and most of the tablet had disintegrated. Only at the far right side were a couple of lines of characters still legible:
illustrious twentieth generation … ancestors
father, head of the family, Mr. Fong Dik Coi
mother, Mrs. Wen, mistress of the house
“This was where your family used to worship the spirits of the ancestors,” said Auyung.
What looked like broken sticks of furniture lay in a heap on the floor. Amy turned them over with her foot, raising a cloud of dust which caught in her throat and made her cough. Auyung pulled out a stick and passed it to her. It looked something like a flute, but thicker and longer. A fine chain was attached to the body of the pipe and in the middle was a raised bowl with an opening. Amy blew away the dust and saw underneath a yellowish pattern, rather like vines twisting around a tree branch. She flicked it with her finger and it made a pinging sound. It was not made of bamboo.
“This is an opium pipe. It’s carved from elephant ivory, and it’s worth a fortune,” said Auyung.
1
Gold Mountain Dream
Year eleven of the reign of Tongzhi to year five of the reign of Guangxu (1872