Hawaii - James Michener [368]
The two women, neither of whom could read, studied the precious slip of paper, and Mrs. Ching asked cautiously, "Are you sure this is your son's?"
"It is."
"And it speaks well?"
Modestly Nyuk Tsin looked down at her feet. In a soft voice she said, "Money, knowledge, a position even better than a scholar in China, a long prosperous life with many children--those were the words for my son."
The two women sat in silence, for each knew what a rare thing was before them. They stared at the premonitory paper and slowly Mrs. Ching rose. "My dear sister-in-law, I think I had better make some more tea." With bounding joy Nyuk Tsin heard these words, for they erased any that had been said earlier, but modestly she kept her eyes down and did not watch Mrs. Ching as she brewed fresh tea--not the old stuff waiting on the back of the stove—and poured it into a fine China cup. This was, up to then, the moment of greatest triumph in Nyuk Tsin's life, and she tasted the fine fresh tea.
"Siu Kim," Mrs. Ching began on a fresh tack, "is an unusual girl and she has been asked for by more than a dozen men, some of them with considerable wealth." Nyuk Tsin sipped her tea and courteously allowed Mrs. Ching to run up the bargaining price for her daughter. Over the edge of her cup, the ruder-mannered younger woman studied the bag of candies and thought: "I will let her talk about her daughter for five minutes, and then I'll explode my next cannon." When Mrs. Ching finished explaining why, in common decency, she had to save Siu Kim for a wealthier man than Africa Kee was apt to be, Nyuk Tsin said bluntly, "It is not every day that an average Hakka girl like Siu Kim has a chance to marry a man who is going to graduate from a fine college in America and become a lawyer. I should think, as her mother, that you would jump at this opportunity and throw in a good dowry as well."
Mrs. Ching was stunned by this news, but she was no mean negotiator. She did not raise an eyebrow but asked in a silky voice, "How can a vegetable woman possibly send her son to America?"
Meticulously Nyuk Tsin counted off: "We own the land up Nuuanu. We own the land in the forest. We own very fine fields in Manoa. Asia owns his restaurant and Europe has paid large sums toward the building where his vegetable store is. Each of my sons works, as do I, and I am sure that right now we have enough money to send Africa to Michigan."
Mrs. Ching was visibly jolted by this narration and she now wheeled into position her heaviest ammunition: "Your son's prospects sound . . . well, interesting. But of course his father was a leper."
Nyuk Tsin did not flinch: "The main reason why I was able to make such a favorable marriage with the Hawaiian girl, who brought us so much land, was that the Hawaiians know me as the Pake Kokua, and they have said that if Africa does become a lawyer, they will send all their business to the son of 'the Pake Kokua." The two tough-minded Hakka women glared at each other in mutual respect, and as they did so, Mrs. Ching made her decision. Imperceptibly, she allowed her right hand to steal across the table. She extended two fingers and slowly encircled the bag of brown candy dusted with poppy seeds. Noiselessly she pulled it toward her, and Nyuk Tsin, witnessing these climactic gestures, thought: "I must not cry." And she fought back her tears, lest they spill out of her sloping eyes and betray to the Ching woman her great joy. With this acceptance of the candy, the marriage was agreed upon.
Up to this time Nyuk Tsin had not yet seen Siu Kim, and of course Africa Kee was not even aware that his auntie was planning his marriage. Neither he nor Siu Kim was told anything, especially since the basic financial negotiations were to consume the better part of a year, but one day Nyuk Tsin saw the attractive girl for whom she had been bargaining, and she admitted to Mrs. Ching: "Your daughter, Beautiful Gold, is even more desirable than you told me." But as she said these