The Last Empress - Anchee Min [120]
Not one nation responded to Guang-hsu's demand for Kang Yu-wei's arrest. Britain, Russia and Japan refused to offer any information of his whereabouts. Instead, foreign newspapers continued to print Kang's lies that "the Emperor of China is being imprisoned and tortured."
Japan also began to apply military pressure by calling for my "forever disappearance." Guang-hsu was believed to have been "drugged, dragged and tied to his dragon seat" to attend audiences with me. In the world's eyes he had been given a "poisonous breakfast" with "mold as a topping." What the Emperor of China desperately needed, it was said, was an invasion by the Western powers.
The situation drove my son deeper into melancholy. He resumed his solitude and refused contact of any kind, including the affection of his beloved Pearl Concubine.
No words could describe my feelings as I watched my son deteriorate. Every morning before we ascended the throne, I would ask him about his night and brief him about the issues before the court. Once in a while Guang-hsu would answer my questions politely, but it was as if his voice came from a great distance. Usually he would simply utter "fine."
From his eunuchs I learned that he had stopped taking the medicine the Western doctors had prescribed. He ordered his bedroom to be draped with black velvet curtains to seal out the sunlight. He stopped reading newspapers and spent his time tinkering with his clocks. He grew so thin that he looked like a fifteen-year-old. Sitting on the throne, he would drift off to sleep.
When I consulted my astrologer, he requested permission to speak freely.
"Your son's interest in clocks is significant," he told me. "'Clock,' in Mandarin, is pronounced the same as 'zone.' It has the same sound and tone as the character zhong, meaning 'ending.'"
"Do you mean his life ... ending?" I asked.
"There is nothing you can do to help, Your Majesty. It is Heaven's will."
I wished that I could tell the astrologer that I had been fighting Heaven's will all my life. My standing alone was proof of my struggle. I had survived what was meant to be my death many times, and I was determined to fight for my son. It was hope that I lived for. When my husband died, Tung Chih became my hope. When Tung Chih died, hope became Guang-hsu.
My hairdo and wigs had never bothered me before, but they did now. I complained to Li Lien-ying that his designs were boring and that the bejeweled ornaments were too heavy. Certain colors that were favorites before irritated me. Washing and dyeing my hair became a burden. Li Lien-ying replaced all his hairdressing tools. Using lightweight wires and clips to pin jewelry onto my fan-shaped hair board, he gave me new height, creating what he called a "three-story umbrella."
This effort to project me as larger than life appeared to succeed—the court seemed humbled by my new look—yet the agony came from within myself. My listlessness grew along with my son's decline. My eyes filled with tears in the middle of a conversation as I remembered the days when Guang-hsu was a loving and courageous child.
I refused to accept the court's conclusion that the Emperor had pushed the country backward. "If Guang-hsu had rocked the ship of state," I reminded the audience, "the ship had long been rudderless, adrift on a chaotic sea and at the mercy of any wind of change."
No one thought about the possibility that Guang-hsu might be suffering a nervous collapse. Given his mother's sad history (Rong's life had been, if anything, more tormented), I should have been the first to understand. But I didn't, or my mind willed me not to. Guang-hsu's focus on the world had shifted downward and settled between his legs—when others stared at him, he grew agitated.
Sitting absent-mindedly, he seemed to hear the audience without following its discussions. The moment he got up from his chair, he would suffer an imagined attack. Maybe he didn't imagine it—in any