Victoria Holt - The House of a Thousand Lanterns

“But you will marry. House want it.”

“You are still worrying about the goddess losing face because a woman owns the house built on her temple?”

Lottie gave her enigmatic giggle. “House pleased now soon there be master.”

She had a basket full of titbits from the kitchens which she was taking to the grave of her ancestors.

“Must take care of ancestors,” she said. “It is the greatest sin not to. Buddha says a good man cares for his dead. If I did not I should never go to Fō.”

I nodded for I had discussed Fō with Sylvester. It was the paradise inhabited by the followers of Buddha—a kingdom of gold where the trees bore glittering gems instead of fruit. It was dominated by the magic seven. There were seven rows of trees, seven fences, and seven bridges and the bridges were made of pearls. Above it all presided the Buddha seated on a lotus flower. Everything in Fō was perfect. There no one was ever hungry nor thirsty; there was no pain and no one ever grew old. It was the hope of everyone, man and woman, to reach this paradise and only through good deeds could he or she achieve it. And as man’s chief duty was to respect and cherish his ancestors one of the most important days of the year was the Feast of the Dead.

I went to the sitting room. There was Sylvester’s empty chair. I wished that he were alive so that I could tell him how grateful I was to him, how I would never forget that I owed him everything.

I could not say that I did not cherish my possessions for I did. I was proud to be the head of the business he had built up. I was proud too to be the owner of The House of a Thousand Lanterns.

How still the house was! They would all have gone to the hillside. Ling Fu had taken Jason to the Go-Down; he and Toby were riding that afternoon. I should have accompanied them but I had a strange feeling that I wished to be by myself in the house on this afternoon.

No sound… only the occasional tinkle of the wind bells and every now and then in the distance the sound of a gong as some procession made its way to the hillside.

There was one thought which kept going round in my head. Your year is up.

As I Stood there in Sylvester’s room and thought of his last hours, there was great booming throughout the house. It was as though everything had become alert suddenly waiting.

I felt my heart begin to hammer. I had an idea what this might mean.

It was the gong at the side of the porch and meant that we had a visitor.

I knew who it was and the familiar joy and apprehension fought with each other.

I went to the door.

He said: “I’ve come as I said I would.”

Then he stepped in and shut the door behind him.

“I was determined not to wait a minute longer,” he went on.

And he took me in his arms and I knew that I had never seriously considered Adam or Toby, for there was no one in the world for me—nor ever would be—but Joliffe.

My calm calculations were swept away. I knew I could never have married anyone but Joliffe. I was as yielding, as eager, as much in love as I had been all those years before. I was reckless. I did not wish to look beyond the immediate future. I knew that I was not going to let anyone stand in my way.

I was living in the Paradise of Fō where every perfection conceivable to the desires and needs of man had been realized. Everything around me was beautiful. If the trees did not bear glittering gems as fruit, then the leaves and the blossoms were a hundred times more beautiful. Everything had changed. The world had become a wonderful place.

I was in love and I would allow no barrier to stand in the way of my happiness.

I was going to marry Joliffe.

* * *

Then I realized that there were people who had to be hurt by all this happiness. There was good Toby for one. I shall never forget the stricken look on his face when I told him.

“So he has come back,” he said blankly.

“Yes,” I replied soberly, “and as soon as he came back I knew it was inevitable.”

Toby did not answer. He looked out of the window of his office onto the water scene, the sampans crowded together with the lines of washing stretched across them, the scurrying to and fro of the rickshaw men. He had seen thousands of them in his time but he was not seeing it then; he was seeing the dream he had conjured up of our being together; and Joliffe, returning to shatter that dream.

All he said was: “Jane, you should not hurry.”

“I know,” I answered gently. “I am not hurrying really. You know my story. Joliffe and I were together for three months and Jason is our son. It had to be, Toby.”

He nodded.

“And Jason?” he said.

“Joliffe is Jason’s father,” I said.

He turned away.

“There’ll be changes… here?” He waved his hand vaguely.

“You mean in the business? Oh no. I intend everything to go on as before… as Sylvester would wish it.”

Toby shook his head.

“Toby,” I said, “it will make no difference to you. Understand that. You were Sylvester’s manager and you will remain mine.”

But he only looked at me sadly. I felt angry suddenly that my pity for him had to intrude on my happiness.

Adam was less resigned. At first he seemed stunned; then he was angry. Angry with fate, with Joliffe and with me.

“So you are going to marry Joliffe!” he said.

“I thought I was married to him before,” I replied gently. “And now that he is free and I am free…”

“You’re crazy,” he said.

“I don’t think so, Adam.”

“I should have thought you would have had the sense to know that it won’t work.”

“My instincts tell me it will.”

“As usual you believe what you wish to believe in face of the odds.”

“Joliffe and I love each other, Adam. We always will.”

“Was that why he deceived you, gave you a child to bring into the world that had no name until you married my uncle to give it one?”

“It was not Joliffe’s fault. He did not know that his wife was still alive.”

“You are very innocent, Jane. That is why I fear for you.”

“I’m fairly experienced of the world and capable of taking care of myself.”

“It doesn’t seem so. You got yourself into a mess and found a way out, and here you are ready to do the same again.”

“I don’t agree with you.”

“No, of course, you don’t. He only has to come back with his plausible tales and you are ready to give up…”

I was sorry. I knew he was hurt. I knew that over the last months he had thought it possible that I might marry him. I had even vaguely considered it might be possible myself. I should have told him right from the start what I knew in my innermost thoughts: that there would never be anyone but Joliffe.

There was something which disturbed me even more. I was doing the very thing that Sylvester had warned me not to do. He had made it clear that he did not trust Joliffe. And surely he had indicated that he wanted me to marry Adam when he had made him Jason’s guardian. He could not have spoken more plainly than that. I could not get Sylvester out of my mind, and the memory cast a shadow over the ecstasy of my reunion with Joliffe. In my sleep I could hear his voice. “It’s like a pattern repeating itself.”

“It’s different now, Sylvester,” I was murmuring one morning when I awoke.

It was different. Joliffe was free now, and I loved Joliffe so much that I could never be happy without him.

Even Lottie seemed dismayed.

“So the year is up,” she said, “and you marry. The house not pleased.”

“What nonsense,” I retorted.

She lifted her hands in a helpless gesture; her half-moon brows shot up. Then she put a finger to her lip. “You hear. You feel.”

“I hear nothing,” I said.

“It is here. The house not pleased.”

There was fear in her eyes; she looked over her shoulder as though she really believed some deity might step out and strike us dead. “The goddess is warning,” she said. “You hear it in the wind bells. It says: ‘Not good.’”

“This is such rubbish,” I said. “At one moment the goddess lost face because a woman owned the house; she wanted me to find a husband quickly—so you said. Well now I am going to be married and she is still not pleased. What does she want?”

Lottie shook her head helplessly.

“You not understand. Great One,” she answered.

But if the goddess was displeased along with Lottie, Toby, and Adam, there was one who was delighted.

Jason placed his hands on my knees and looked up to me, his face glowing.

“I’m going to have a father,” he said.

“Yes, Jason,” I told him. “You’ll like that, won’t you?”

He laughed. Of course he would like it.

“I’ll tell you something,” he said, standing on tiptoe.

“Yes, Jason?”

“He was my real father all the time. He told me.”

* * *

So we were married and I was happy as I had never thought to be again.

Joliffe had wanted us to have a honeymoon but I had refused this.

We should have had to take Jason, I said, if we went away. He protested a little but finally agreed with me, for where would we have gone but into China? I did not think it was suitable to take Jason with us.

“What does a honeymoon matter,” said Joliffe. “It’s the marriage that’s important… being together for the rest of our lives, Jane. What a prospect.”

It was a glorious prospect. Now we could start dreaming and planning as we had years ago. We were taking up the threads of our story.

They were glorious days when sometimes he and I went out alone leaving Jason in the care of Lottie; at others we took him with us. We crossed to Hong Kong Island and picnicked on the sandy shore of Big Wave Bay. Sometimes we rode out and watched the workers in the paddy fields. We shopped in the Thieves’ Market and peeped into temples where joss sticks gleamed on altars and incense hung in spirals from the ceilings; we had our fortunes told by the pavement seer and the trained sparrow picked out a lucky card for us. We took a small craft and sailed in the bay and threw coins to the small boys who delighted to dive down into the clear water to pick them up. Everything seemed beautiful—the rocking sampans on the water, the women with their little babies in slings on their backs, the rickshaw men in their coolie hats, the stall owners squatting on the pavements to make their bargains with those who bought their goods. It seemed a beautiful place with the smell of dried fish everywhere and the painted signs hanging from their shops adorned with the exquisite Chinese letters.

It was Paris again. It was the love haze which enveloped everything, heightening the colors, making the world dance, touching even the work-worn faces of the Hakka women with beauty.

One early morning when he lay awake and talked of the wonder of being together again Joliffe mentioned Jason, and how delighted he was in the boy, how he had thought of him constantly and had railed against a fate which had separated him from his son.

“And that will of Sylvester’s,” he said. “To think that Sylvester named Adam as his guardian. I don’t like it, Jane.”

“It is only in the event of my death,” I said.

He held me tightly against him. “Don’t mention such a thing.”

“My dearest. It’s something I won’t think of. It’s not going to happen anyway. I’m going to die before you.”

“No,” I said fearfully.

We clung together until Joliffe burst out laughing.

“Who’s going to die? We’re young, aren’t we? We’re healthy. We’re going to live for years and years, both of us. In any case you’re younger than I am, Jane. So I shall die first.”

“I couldn’t bear it,” I said.

He stroked my hair. “What fools we are! Assuring ourselves that we are going to be the one to die first because we don’t want to be the one who’s left. One of us will have to be that.”

For a moment we were silent then we laughed and made love and we were happy, but before we slept Joliffe said: “It should be altered, Jane.”

“How… altered?”

“Easily. Sylvester nominated Adam as Jason’s guardian. I couldn’t tolerate my son’s having anyone but me as a guardian. But that’s what would happen if you… Jane…”