The Last Empress - Anchee Min [39]
"What must I know?" I asked.
There was no response. Li Lien-ying looked at me as if he didn't understand. I realized that I was still used to An-te-hai's ways and that Li Lien-ying hadn't yet learned the role of being my eunuch secretary.
"You may brief me, starting with the weather."
Li Lien-ying was indeed a quick learner. "The icy wind has been blowing down sandstorms from the desert," he began, helping me to dress. "Last night the braziers were lit in the courtyards."
"Go on."
"Li Hung-chang moved his army from Chihli on your orders. He has secured the Forbidden City. Governors of the eighteen provinces have hurried to get here, some by carriage and some on horseback. They are entering the gates at this moment. Yung Lu has been notified of the situation and should be here within days."
I was surprised. "I did neither the ordering nor the summoning."
"Empress Nuharoo did."
"Why didn't she inform me about it?"
"Empress Nuharoo was here several times while you were sleeping," Li Lien-ying explained. "Her exact words were 'Tung Chih has left no heir, and an emperor has to be chosen.'"
"To the Hall of Spiritual Nurturing! Palanquin!" I ordered.
Nuharoo was relieved when she saw me enter the hall. "Three candidates have been suggested." She presented me with notes of the day's discussion. "All members of the Imperial clan are present."
Although my fatigue persisted, I tried to look as if I had never left the court. I examined the candidates. The first was a two-month-old named P'u-lun, grandson of Emperor Tao Kuang's eldest son—my husband's brother Prince Ts'eng. Since Tung Chih's "Tsai" generation was followed by the "P'u" generation, the infant was the only nominee who complied with Imperial family law, which stated that the successor to the throne could not be a member of the same generation as his predecessor.
I quickly dismissed P'u-lun. My reason was that my husband had told me that P'u-lun's grandfather Prince Ts'eng had been adopted from a junior branch of the Imperial family and so was not of the true bloodline. "We know of no precedent for the grandson of an adopted son to mount the throne," I said.
The truth behind my rejection was that I had some idea of the kind of man Prince Ts'eng was. While pleasure-seeking had been his hobby, he was a corrupt political radical. He had little respect for me until he learned about my son's death. He knew that I would have the power to choose an heir.
When an advocate of Prince Ts'eng's, a court official, produced a document from the Ming Dynasty's records proving the prince's legitimacy, I reminded the court, "That particular Ming prince's reign ended in disaster, with the prince himself captured and murdered by the Mongols."
The next male child in line was Prince Kung's eldest son, Tsai-chen, Tung Chih's former playmate. As hard as I tried, I could not forgive the fact that he had introduced Tung Chih to the brothels. I rejected Tsai-chen by saying, "The law requires that the living father of an emperor retire into private life, and I don't think the court can function without Prince Kung."
I wanted to yell at Nuharoo and the court: How could we entrust a playboy with the nation's responsibilities? I would have ordered Tsai-chen's beheading if he were not Prince Kung's son!
The last one in line was Tsai-t'ien, my three-year-old nephew, son of Prince Ch'un, my husband's youngest brother, who was also the husband of my sister, Rong. Although we would be violating the "no-same-generation" rule if we selected Tsai-t'ien, we had no other option.
In the end, both Nuharoo and I gave our votes to Tsai-t'ien. We let it be known that we would adopt the child if the court were to accept our proposal. In fact, I had already been thinking about adopting Tsai-t'ien. The idea came when I learned that three of my sister's children had died "accidentally" in their infancy. The deaths were regarded as the work of fate, but I was aware of Rong's mental condition. Prince Ch'un complained about his wife's ongoing deterioration, but no action was taken and Rong