In China courtship--such pre-nuptial courtship as there is--is long and
slow; longest and slowest among the girdle-wearers.
Maturity sets the pace in China, and maturity takes a slow speed. And
it is the fathers who canvass, accept or reject, bargain and rebargain,
with infinite shrewdness and great deliberation the innumerable
preliminaries of every marriage; the two fathers who at long last
“make-arrange” all the hundred conditions of betrothal and the ten
score details of the actual marriage function. And the indispensable
_mei-jêns_, the professional or amateur matchmakers, paid not for piece
work, but in proportion to the difficulty of their completed task and
of the time it has taken them, eat up endless months and _yuan_. The
longer the _mei-jên_ can delay, without imperiling it, the betrothal
ceremony--far more binding and inviolable than the marriage itself--and
the longer the matchmaker, after the long delayed betrothal, again can
delay the marriage day, the heavier can that “smiling-faced one” make
his bill--often a truly terrible document--that is always paid.
It would have taken Sên Ruben a long lapse of time to have married C’hi
Yamei in China.
But Ruben Sên realized almost at once that the less elaborate and less
circuitous ways of Europe would be more acceptable to C’hi Ng Yelü from
his daughter’s suitor, so thoroughly had C’hi accepted the philosophy,
more convenient than patriotic, of doing in Rome as those of Rome do.
Ruben believed that C’hi would give the straight question a straight
and immediate answer.
And Ruben Sên could have but little doubt that C’hi would answer him
favorably.
No one else, interested enough to watch C’hi and Sên together, had any
doubt at all.
And Ruben was sure that he might woo and wed C’hi Yamei quickly in
London--if C’hi Ng Yelü permitted it at all. Sên believed too that C’hi
would. There was nothing of vanity, no touch of over self-assurance, in
the lover’s conviction that this was so; for almost C’hi had indicated
it. If this shocked Chinese-minded Sên somewhat, it also cleared his
way very pleasantly.
That his own mixed blood was not going to prove a barrier in C’hi’s
judgment, nor an offense to the older man’s taste, surprised Ruben less
than it logically and normally should. For Ruben had so thought of
himself always as purely Chinese that he was apt to overlook what other
Chinese scarcely could. He _felt_ Chinese--even in a dinner jacket in
his London club--and because he felt Chinese he had come to consider
that he was Chinese--impeccably Chinese.
But he did suspect that, other things being equal, C’hi would not
altogether object to an English-domiciled husband for his daughter. The
old nomad liked being in England and said so calmly.
Once when Sên had said how much he regretted that he could not live
at home in China--probably not for many years--C’hi had very nearly
rebuked him.
“Stay where you are and be thankful,” Ng Yelü said sturdily in his
ready English. “This is the more comfortable country of the two now.
There is no telling what those rascals are going to turn old China into
before long. China still awaits and needs her strong man. Our old hope
that Feng Yu-hsieng might prove he, is shattered. It was Feng who drove
our Son of Heaven out from the Sacred Forbidden City and, doing it,
sank to the gutter-level of the world’s regicides. There is no daybreak
in China yet, Sên. We who love her most firmly can only wait and watch.
I choose to do it here in England for this troubled present. Your
duty is with your mother, unquestionably. If I were younger, I might
feel called upon to stay away from Shan-si less than I do. But I am
neither politician nor war-lord--not even much stuff for bannerman. And
I am glad to have my girl in England’s safety. It might have been she
that was martyred at An Mu-ti. That experience turned my stomach. My
gorge rises, and my blood runs icy whenever I think of it. She is all
I have got. I loved her mother. I miss my wife every day of my life,
Sên. The girl is very like her mother. I have no wish to see her--as I
saw her poor little cousin; no wish to have her killed--or worse--in
some Peking anti-legation broil or mob riot. It will please me best if
Yamei stays in England. I could come and go then--oh, I have not turned
my back on my own country--I could come and go as I chose--live part
of my time not too far from the one thing I care for, warm me at her
husband’s fireside sometimes.”
That was plain speech for a Chinese father.
Sên did not exaggerate the significance. He thought it indicative,
but not a direct personal opening offered to himself; still less a
point-blank invitation.
Sên was right there.
C’hi liked Ruben and respected his intelligence enough to like to
talk to him freely and with some intimacy. C’hi Ng Yelü was not
husband-hunting for his daughter. He no more desired Sên to marry
Yamei than he was opposed to it. He had no doubt that his lovely,
charming and lovable girl would marry well and suitably. He expected
her to marry a Chinese and, of course, a gentleman. An English duke
come a-wooing of her would have had short shrift from C’hi Ng Yelü.
But C’hi was sore afraid for China’s immediate future, though not for
her ultimate future which he believed securely founded in the bedrock
of Chinese character. Even if China were conquered--C’hi did not
anticipate it--she would absorb and in absorbing reconquer, as she
always had. But fearing his country’s near future, he hoped his only
living child might marry one of the many traveled Chinese of her own
caste who more and more were making long sojourns, if not permanent
residence, in the happier West. He liked and esteemed Sên Ruben
immensely, and he trusted him. But he did regard Sên’s white blood as
some sort of a bar-sinister, very slight, but real and indelible. He
would have preferred a son-in-law impeccably Chinese. To the son of an
English father and a Chinese wife he would not have given Yamei. But a
mother’s ancestry mattered so much less! Mrs. Sên had become Chinese
at her marriage. And Ruben had so much that more than balanced the
disadvantage of mixed parentage.
C’hi Ng Yelü was content to leave it with the gods, which was merely
his easy way of putting it, for C’hi had little faith in any gods. His
cosmopolitanism had purged all the theologies from him. Millions of
educated Chinese who never have left their native province, never have
seen a treaty port, or wished to, are adamant agnostics.
All of which Sên understood rather accurately. He believed that C’hi
would not repulse his suit; but he felt sure that C’hi would not have
spoken so frankly had he actively wished to bring about that particular
betrothal.
Would C’hi Yamei be content to have it so? That was what he longed to
know, and feared to learn.
She did not dislike him or she would have spared fewer hours to him,
granted him less of her friendliness, in her own home and here in
London society.
The _camaraderie_ she gave him frankly and gaily seemed to warn him
that Yamei did not care--perhaps never would.
But, of late--for it was September now--she seemed to have grown shyer
with him. That hinted that she had read his purpose, and that it did
not displease her, not even while it startled her girlish serenity.
Sên had no doubt in whose hands his fate lay. He believed that
spiritually and socially emancipated C’hi Ng Yelü would not try to
force or influence C’hi Yamei’s inclination.
Ruben was not sure--but he hoped.
Once or twice when he had suddenly spoken to her in Chinese C’hi Yamei
had flushed exquisitely; as the weeks passed his hope grew.
The flood-tide of his love was high.