Beasts of a Little Land(8)

“So this is the child?” the courtesan said mildly, and her mother mumbled in response. A cousin’s friend was a servant in this house, which was how Jade was arranged to be taken in as a laundry maid earning two won a month, plus her room and board.

“It’s a long way to be walking in the mud and the snow,” the woman said to her mother but kept her gaze fixed on Jade. Then she sighed, as if seeing something regrettable that could not be helped. Jade imagined that those slender eyes were accustomed to judging the value of finer things, and that her own dry, chapped face was so beneath the mark as to incite pity, like a three-legged dog.

“Auntie, I’m sorry to tell you this. But there’s been a mistake. I didn’t hear anything from you for a fortnight and so I went ahead and hired another girl to help around the house. But since you’ve made this trip, please go and have a meal in the kitchen. Rest a while before heading back,” she said, shaking her beautiful head wreathed in a braided chignon.

“No, how can that be, Madame Silver? We had sent word.” Jade’s mother pressed her hands together in front of her chest. The gesture struck Jade as rustic and off-putting, especially in contrast to Silver’s cool elegance. “Wouldn’t you need another helper in such a big household? My Jade has been taking care of chores since she was four years old. She’s bound to be useful.”

“I have plenty of help as is,” Silver said impatiently. Nevertheless, Jade sensed that the courtesan continued to stare at her with a curious expression in that calm oval face. It was a look of someone who didn’t always deign to respond to others and spoke only when it pleased her to say something.

“But if you want, I can take Jade as an apprentice.” Silver turned to her mother with an air of finality. “One-time payment of fifty won—as much as she would have earned as a maid in two years. Plus her room, board, training, and clothes. After she starts working in a few years and pays me back the fifty won plus interest, she’ll be free to send you whatever she likes.”

Jade’s mother drew a tight line with her mouth. “I didn’t come here to sell my daughter to become a courtesan,” she managed to spit out, overpronouncing the last word in lieu of saying: whore. “What kind of a mother do you think I am?”

“As you wish.” Silver didn’t seem perturbed, but Jade noticed that the corner of her mouth twisted with the tail end of a scornful smile. “At any rate, please help yourself to some soup in the kitchen,” she said, turning around.

“Wait, Madame.” Jade was surprised to hear herself speak. Her mother tapped her shoulder to silence her, but she continued. “I will stay here as an apprentice . . . It’s okay, Mama. I’ll do it.”

“Shush. You don’t know anything about what this is,” her mother said. Had they been alone, she would have poured out salty diatribes about women who made their keep between their legs. In Silver’s presence, she only smacked Jade between her sharp shoulder blades like the folded wings of an unfledged bird.

Silver smiled, as if hearing the unspoken thoughts. “It’s true, this isn’t for everyone. Do you know what we do?”

Jade brightly blushed and nodded. Her friends whose sisters had been married at fourteen or fifteen had told her what had happened on their wedding night. It seemed unpleasant but the thought also made her clutch her thighs. All things considered, whether it happened for free with one man or for money with many men seemed to be of little consequence, physically speaking. Jade would have been married off in a few years anyway to whoever offered the highest price, like the village doctor, who had been tirelessly seeking a bride for his sick son. In spite of her pity, Jade felt anything was preferable to marrying that simple boy with his clawlike hands. She wouldn’t really be his wife, but his sister and then later his mother.

Fifty won was more than twice as much as even that doctor would give, and the money could go a long way—a small plot of land from their landlord, a young rooster and healthy hens for a chicken run. They would never again go to bed without dinner. They could send the boys to school, and the younger girl could make a match with a respectable, landowning family. But only if no one in the village knew that Jade had been sold to a courtesan’s house.

Jade could almost see the same vision reflected in her mother’s dark eyes, too exhausted even for tears. Silver reached out and held her mother’s hand, and she didn’t pull away.

“In my experience, even a girl kept in a convent can grow up to be a courtesan if she’s meant to become one. The reverse is also true, and more often too. If Jade isn’t meant for this, she’ll find another path, even if she’s raised in a gibang.” Silver smiled gently. “I almost have no hand in it.”

*

JADE HAD NEVER SEEN HERSELF in a mirror before arriving at Silver’s house. The muted reflections she did glimpse on washing basins had not been a source of special vanity. She had a matte, smooth skin with a candle-wax yellow tinge. Her eyes were small but very bright under a pair of fluffy eyebrows like black feathers. By looking very closely, one could see that her left iris was positioned ever so slightly off-center, pointing outward—a fishlike tendency. Her lips were round and red, even without rouge. Her smile—twinkly, with an undertone of mischief—would have been considered charming had it not framed a few undeniably crooked upper teeth. There were other peculiarities to her physique that a more exceptional girl certainly would not have had. All told, Jade was the kind of young girl who stood exactly at the midpoint between plain and pretty. She hadn’t minded, since her mother was suspicious of beauty in general.