The calligrapher's daughter_ a novel - Eugenia Kim [51]
Han folded and sealed the letter and gave Joong coins for the post, cursing as he silently admitted that for the price of a few jeon, he could rely on the letter arriving in Chae’s hands within days, rather than having to send his servant to Yuncheon. The postal service had escalated in reach and efficiency after the Japanese crisscrossed the country with train tracks. The image had once inspired him to create an unusually stark painting: a resplendent phoenix struggling to fly in iron chains. It was urgent that Ilsun receive classical training. The last time Han had visited Deacon Hwang, there were men of all ages sitting together, not just chronological peers. What would be next? Women and babies joining in men’s talk?
Han sighed. His consent in the mail, he would soon tell his wife. For now, he perused his winnowed shelves and settled on a slim volume of poems on the renewal of spring. When his wife appeared with Cook to ask if he wished to eat in his study, Han felt refreshed from his reading.
“In my sitting room,” he said, choosing that formal setting as preferable for her to receive his decision. His wife took the tray from Cook and followed him, and after he sat, she arranged it so comfortably and with such pleasing grace that he was loath to ruin the simple moment of domestic harmony with upset. He said nothing, and she left.
He ate slowly, selecting morsels of rice, spring greens, winter radish gimchi, mashed soybean flavored with pork belly, and egg pancakes with wild leeks as carefully as he’d choose the words to tell her. Perfectly balanced in the ancient fivefold way, the food, washed down with sips of bone broth, sank warmly to his stomach. He quietly gave thanks for his wife’s cooking skill, which with every meal provided variety and nutrition, and kept his sensitive digestion in balance.
After he’d eaten and Cook removed the dishes, he reached for his tobacco box and called for his wife. She sat before him, poured wine and folded her hands together on her lap. Her skin shone with the kitchen’s heat, and though he surmised her mind was always busy with household planning or the children’s concerns, she appeared calm and untroubled, the moon curves of her face still as smooth and pale as when he first saw her on their wedding day. He had been twenty; she, seventeen. Except for her well-defined nose, she had classic beauty, her eyes like two clean strokes of ink, her brow smooth and rounded.
The serene lines of his sparsely furnished room gleamed in slants of afternoon light. Birds chattered happily outside. He could hear their wings beating against budding tender leaves. He sucked dryly on his pipe. “Yuhbo, your daughter will soon receive a chest of fabric for her trousseau.” The groom’s family typically sent these early gifts—the first exchange toward the coming bond. Ignoring his wife’s sudden sharp intake of breath and her surprised eyes directly on his, Han tapped and filled his pipe, and as she lit it, he noted that her fingers trembled. “From the yangban son of Chae Julpyang in Yuncheon. We studied together and I know his is an honorable family.”
“But she has school until—”
“After her graduation. A harvest moon wedding. It’s settled.”
Her cheeks flamed. “Without once consulting your wife?”
His eyes narrowed and his mouth tensed in dismay. Never before had she raised her voice to him. “It is my right.”
She straightened and glared openly. “Our only daughter. She’s far too young!”
“The boy is twelve. It’s a respectable gap. They’ll have enough years before children.”
“And you would refuse me the courtesy to decide for myself if this boy-husband is appropriate for her?”
“The decision is made! The letter of agreement was sent this very morning.”
“This morning?