‘We’ve only just got our poetry club started, and already someone is trying to wriggle out of it. It’s Xi-chun. She’s asking for a year’s leave of absence.’
‘I can guess why that is,’ said Dai-yu. ‘It’s because of what Grandmother said about painting the Garden. She’s decided to use that as an excuse.’
‘I don’t think you should blame Grandmother,’ said Tan-chun. ‘It’s what Grannie Liu said that started it.’
‘Grannie Liu, yes, that’s right,’ Dai-yu hurriedly corrected herself. ‘Whose “grannie” is she anyway, I’d like to know? “Old Mother Locust” we ought to call her, not “Grannie Liu”.’
This set them all laughing.
‘If one wants to hear the demotic at its most forceful,’ said Bao-chai, ‘one has to listen to Cousin Feng. Fortunately for us she can’t read, so her jokes are somewhat lacking in finesse and the language she uses can never rise above the level at which it is commonly spoken. The secret of Frowner’s sarcastic tongue is that she uses the method adopted by Confucius when he edited the Spring and Autumn Annals, that is to say, she extracts the essentials from vulgar speech and polishes and refines them, so that when she uses them to illustrate a point, each word or phrase is given its maximum possible effectiveness. The mere name “Old Mother Locust”, for example, is sufficient to evoke the whole scene of yesterday’s party and everything that happened at it. What’s more, she is able to do this sort of thing almost without thinking.’
The others, still laughing, assured Bao-chai that she excelled as a commentator no less than Dai-yu and Xi-feng, in their different ways, as wits.
‘The reason I asked you all here is because I wanted your advice on how long we ought to give her,’ said Li Wan. ‘I said a month, but she says that’s much too short. What do you all think?’
‘Logically a year wouldn’t be at all too long,’ said Dai-yu. ‘If it took a whole year to build the Garden, she would naturally require about two years in which to paint it. First she’s got to grind her ink, then she’s got to soften her brushes, then she’s got to fix the paper, then she’s got to find her colours, and then –’
The others realized that this was a joke at Xi-chun’s expense.
‘Yes?’ they said, playing up to her. ‘What then?’
Dai-yu, unable to maintain a straight face, was beginning to giggle.
‘– and then proceed in like manner, by gradual degrees, to paint it.’
Prolonged hilarity and clapping of hands.
‘ “In like manner, by gradual degrees”,’ said Bao-chai. ‘I like that. The telling phrase at the end. The trouble with all those jokes we were laughing at yesterday is that they were funny enough at the time, but on recollection they seem rather stupid. Dai-yu’s jokes on the other hand, though the words at first appear colourless, are richly humorous to remember. They certainly make me laugh a lot.’
‘You shouldn’t flatter her, Cousin Chai,’ said Xi-chun plaintively. ‘It encourages her to show off. It’s because you complimented her on her joke about Grannie Liu that she’s started making fun of me.’
‘Tell me now,’ said Dai-yu, taking Xi-chun’s hand in her own, ‘is it to be a picture of the Garden alone, or are we to be in it as well?’
‘It was originally to have been of the Garden alone,’ said Xi-chun, ‘but afterwards Grandmother said that that would make it look too much like an architect’s drawing and told me to put in some people. She said what we wanted was something like one of those paintings of “Scholars Enjoying Themselves in a Landscape”. The trouble is, I don’t know how to do buildings in the Elaborate style, and I’m no good at human figures; but as I was too scared to refuse, I’ve got myself into a mess.’
‘Human figures are no problem,’ said Dai-yu. ‘It’s the insect-painting that’s going to give you the trouble.’
‘Now you’re talking nonsense,’ said Li Wan. ‘What need will there be of insects in a painting of the Garden? A few animals and birds dotted here and there maybe, but no insects, surely?’
‘If she has no other insects in it, she’s got to have Old Mother Locust,’ said Dai-yu. ‘Without her the painting would be incomplete.’
The others all laughed. Dai-yu continued, laughing so much herself that she had to clutch her chest with both hands:
‘You must hurry up and get on with the painting. I’ve already thought of a title to inscribe on it when it’s finished. You must call it “With Locust to the Chew”.’
The others threw back their heads and roared. Their laughter ended abruptly, however, when a loud crash caused them to look anxiously around them to see what had fallen.
It turned out to have been Xiang-yun’s chair. It had been a somewhat rickety one to start with, and in laughing she had thrown herself back against it so violently that the two joints connecting the chairback with the seat had sprung, causing her to sink backwards and sideways, still sitting in the disintegrating chair. Fortunately she was saved by the room’s wooden partition from falling onto the floor. The undignified spectacle of her descent provoked fresh shouts of mirth which only gradually subsided when Bao-yu hurried over and helped her to her feet.
As he passed Dai-yu he signalled to her with his eyes. Understanding that something must be wrong with her appearance, she slipped into Li Wan’s bedroom and took the cover off the mirror to have a look. It was the hair above her brows that was coming loose. She pulled out the drawer in Li Wan’s dressing-box, took out two little vanity-brushes, primmed her hair at the mirror, then, hurriedly replacing everything, went back into the outer room, where the others were still laughing. She pointed a finger accusingly at Li Wan.
‘So this is your idea of “supervision in needlework and moral instruction” – inviting us over here for jokes and horseplay!’
‘Did you hear that, all of you?’ said Li Wan. ‘This is the ringleader who sets everyone else laughing and misbehaving, yet she has the effrontery to blame me for starting it all! Oh, I could—! Well, all I can say is that I hope when you marry you have a real Tartar for a mother-in-law and lots of nasty sisters-in-law with tongues as sharp as yours. It will serve you right!’
Dai-yu, blushing, clung to Bao-chai’s hand.
‘Let’s give her a year’s leave, shall we?’
‘Let me suggest what I think is a fair compromise and see what the rest of you think of it,’ said Bao-chai. ‘It’s true that Lotus Dweller can paint, but “painting” in her case means no more than an occasional sketch in the Impressionistic style. Now of course, you couldn’t paint this Garden in the first place if you didn’t have impressions of it; but the trouble is that the Garden itself was designed rather like a painting, with every rock, every tree, every building in it carefully and precisely placed in order to produce a particular scenic effect; and if you tried to get your impressions of all of these different scenes onto paper exactly as they are, they simply wouldn’t make a picture. The shape of the paper imposes its own perspectives. You have to make them into a composition. You have to decide which to bring into the foreground and which to push into the background, which to leave out altogether and which to show only in glimpses. When you’ve done that, you can make your rough draft. And even then, it’s only when you’ve studied the draft for a long time and corrected it until you’re satisfied that you can go ahead with your transfer.
‘One of your difficulties is going to be the ruler-work. With all those buildings you’re going to have to do the straight lines with a ruler, and in ruler-work if you’re not very careful it’s easy to make the most terrible mistakes – railings that slant to one side, leaning pillars, windows on the skew or steps drawn out of line. Sometimes careless ruling can produce even more grotesque results, like a table squashed into a wall or a flower-pot apparently resting on the side of a curtain. Any one of these things is enough to make a painting look ridiculous.
‘Putting in the human figures is going to be another problem. First of all you have to be very careful that you have got them in t
he right perspective. Then again, in painting figures the clothes and the position of the hands and feet are of great importance. A careless slip of the brush can mean a monstrously swollen hand or a crippled leg. Compared with these, little mishaps like the colour of the face running into the hair are of minor importance.
‘In my opinion this painting is going to be very, very difficult. And since a year is thought to be too long and a month too short, the compromise I suggest is that she should be allowed half a year to do it in, but that Cousin Bao should be appointed to help her. My reason is not that I think he knows more about painting than she does and can tell her how to do it – I am sure that if he tried, it would only make matters worse – but because whenever there is anything she doesn’t know about or has difficulty in putting in, he will be able to take the painting to one or another of his men friends outside who know about these matters and ask for their advice.’
Bao-yu was enthusiastic.
‘That’s a splendid idea. Zhan Guang can do Elaborate style buildings and Cheng Ri-xing is very good at women. I’ll go and have a word with them now.’
‘Didn’t I tell you you ought to be called “Busybody”?’ said Bao-chai. ‘Just because I’ve mentioned the possibility, you don’t have to go rushing off straight away. Wait until we’ve finished discussing what needs to be done, then you can go and see them. The question now is, what is she going to do this painting on?’
‘We’ve got some Snow Wave paper still,’ said Bao-yu. ‘It comes in large enough pieces and it holds the ink well.’
‘Oh, you’re just hopeless!’ said Bao-chai. ‘Snow Wave is a good, ink-receptive paper for doing calligraphy or Impressionist style paintings on, and it will stand up to the wrinkle-and-wipe work in a Southern School landscape; but it is quite unsuitable for a painting like this one involving detailed colouring and layer upon layer of graded washes. You’d merely ruin the picture and waste the paper.
‘Now I’ll tell you what to do. Before they started on the construction of this Garden, they made a very detailed drawing of the layout. It was only an artist’s impression, but the measurements shown on it were all accurate. Why don’t you ask Lady Wang for that drawing and then ask Cousin Feng to give you a piece of heavyweight pongee of the same dimensions? Cousin Bao can get Uncle Zheng’s gentlemen to size it for you, and they can make you a draft by adapting the architect’s drawing and putting in the human figures. He could even get them to touch in some of the blue-and-green background for you and indicate where the outlines will need reinforcing with milk gold or milk silver.
‘Meanwhile you must get hold of a portable stove that you can use for melting and extracting your glue on and for heating the water to wash your brushes with. You’ll also need a long distemperer’s table, and a blanket to cover it, for resting your painting on. And I don’t suppose your present supply of paint-saucers and brushes is likely to be adequate. You’d better start from scratch and get yourself a completely new outfit.’
‘I haven’t got any equipment to speak of,’ said Xi-chun. ‘I just use my ordinary writing-brushes when I want to paint. As for colours: red ochre, Canton indigo, gamboge and safflower red are the only four I’ve got. Apart from that, all I have is a couple of colouring brushes.’
‘Why ever didn’t you tell me before?’ said Bao-chai. ‘I’ve still got lots of these things. The only thing is, if I give them to you before you actually need them, they will only be lying around doing nothing in your room the same as they now are in mine. On second thoughts I think I’ll hang on to them for the time being. We can say that I am keeping them for you. But I can let you have any of them you want as soon as the need arises. I’d rather you used my stuff for painting fans with and that sort of thing, though. It would be a waste to use it on this great big painting of the Garden. What I’ll do for you now is to make out a list of materials you can ask Lady Jia for. You may not know about some of these things, so perhaps it would be a good idea if Cousin Bao were to take them down at my dictation.’
Bao-yu had brush and ink already prepared. He had been intending in any case to take notes, in order to have his own record of what she said, and had merely to pick up his brush and wait for her to begin.
Here is the list she dictated:
large size raft brushes
4
No. 2 size raft brushes
4
No. 3 size raft brushes
4
large wash layers
4
medium wash layers
4
small wash layers
4
large Southern crab’s claws
10
small Southern crab’s claws
10
whisker brushes
10
large colouring brushes
20
small colouring brushes
20
face liners
10
willow-slip brushes
20
arrow-shaped cinnabar
4 oz.
Southern red ochre
4 oz.
orpiment
4 oz.
azurite
4 oz.
malachite
4 oz.
brush-stick gamboge
4 oz.
Canton indigo
8 oz.
oyster-shell white
4 boxes
safflower red
10 sheets
red powder-gold
200 leaves
gold foil
200 leaves
quality Canton glue
4 oz.
clear alum
4 oz.
‘That doesn’t allow for the alum and glue that will be needed for the sizing,’ said Bao-chai. ‘You can leave that to the menfolk.
‘By the time these colours have been washed and ground and emulsified and graded, you should have enough there to last you a lifetime – messing about and practice-work included.’
She continued with her list:
superfine silk strainers
4
coarse silk strainers
2
strainer-brushes
4
mortars, various sizes
4
coarse bowls
20
5-in. saucers
10
3-in. porcelain ditto
20
portable stoves
2
casseroles, various sizes
4
new porcelain water-jars
2
new water-buckets
4
1-ft white linen bags
4
light charcoal
20 catties
willow-wood charcoal
1 catty
3-drawer chest of drawers
1
gauze, close-woven
1 ell
raw ginger
2 oz.
soy sauce
½ catty
‘– a cooking-pot and a frying-slice,’ Dai-yu added hurriedly.
‘What are they for?’ said Bao-chai.
‘To use with the ginger and soy sauce,’ said Dai-yu. ‘Then she’ll be able to cook the colours and eat them.’
The others laughed, including Bao-chai herself.
‘Frowner! Frowner!’ she said. ‘What do you know about it? If you didn’t first season the new saucers by rubbing ginger-juice and sauce on the bottom and burning them in, they would crack when you put them on the heat.’
The others assured Dai-yu that this was so. Dai-yu, meanwhile, was reading through the list.
‘Just look!’ she said, laying a hand on Tan-chun’s arm and speaking to her in an undertone. ‘All those water-jars and chests of drawers and things to paint a picture! I think she must have got confused at this point and started making a list for her trousseau.’
This set Tan-chun off into a fit of the giggles. ‘Pinch her lips, Chai!’ she said. ‘You
should hear what she’s been saying about you.’
‘I don’t need to,’ said Bao-chai. ‘One doesn’t expect ivory from a dog’s mouth!’
Bearing down on Dai-yu as she said this, she forced her back, laughing and protesting, upon the kang and made as if she would pinch her face.
‘Oh, please coz, forgive me!’ Dai-yu pleaded. ‘Little Frowner is younger than you and doesn’t know any better. You should teach me how to be good. If you won’t be nice to me, who else can I turn to?’
The others, not knowing what lay behind these words, were greatly amused.
‘Do forgive her!’ they said, laughing. ‘How pitifully she pleads! Even we are melted.’
But Bao-chai knew she was referring to their recent confrontation on the subject of forbidden books, and feeling rather embarrassed to have this dragged up in the midst of a playful tussle, hurriedly released her. Dai-yu rose to her feet laughing.
‘That’s my good coz. If it had been me, I should never have let you off!’
Bao-chai pointed her finger at Dai-yu and smiled at her indulgently.
‘I’m not surprised that Lady Jia is so fond of you or that the others find you so amusing. I can’t help being fond of you too, little coz. Come here and let me do your hair for you.’
Dai-yu turned her head obediently while Bao-chai refastened her back hair. Bao-yu, watching from where he sat, thought how much better it looked for Bao-chai’s attention, and wished that he had not told Dai-yu earlier to tidy the hair above her brows, for then Bao-chai could have done that for her too. His agreeable musings on the subject were interrupted by Bao-chai’s voice:
‘Have you finished writing the list? Perhaps you’d better be the one to see Lady Jia about it. If they’ve got those things here already, so much the better. If not, you’ll have to get some money to buy them with. In that case I might be able to advise you on where to go for them.’