1 "Three-Inch Golden Lilies'
一 “三寸金莲”
——Concubine to a Warlord General (1909-1933)
——嫁给军阀为妾(1909—1933年)
At the age of fifteen my grandmother became the concubine of a warlord general, the police chief of a tenuous national government of China. The year was 1924 and China was in chaos. Much of it, including Manchuria, where my grandmother lived, was ruled by warlords. The liaison was arranged by her father, a police official in the provincial town of Yixian in southwest Manchuria, about a hundred miles north of the Great Wall and 250 miles northeast of Peking.
我姥姥十五岁时，就嫁给一个军阀作妾。这年是1924年，在大小军阀的割治下，整个中国战乱频仍。婚事是姥姥的父亲精心策划、刻意安排的。当时，那位军阀身居北京北洋政府警察总监要职，地位显赫，权倾一时。而姥姥的父亲不过是东北的一座偏远小城——义县警察局的职员。
Like most towns in China, Yixian was built like a fortress. It was encircled by walls thirty feet high and twelve feet thick dating from the Tang dynasty (AD 618-907), surmounted by battlements, dotted with sixteen forts at regular intervals, and wide enough to ride a horse quite easily along the top. There were four gates into the city, one at each point of the compass, with outer protecting gates, and the fortifications were surrounded by a deep moat.
义县位于长城以北一百哩处，距北京二百五十哩。它与中国多数城市相似，建得像座堡垒。自唐朝以来，它就被三十呎高、十二呎宽的城墙团团围住，城墙上修建了雉堞，和按一定距离分布的十六座箭楼。箭楼卓然有序地点缀其间。宽阔的城墙顶部可以纵马驰骋。东、西、南、北四门扼守入城要道，城门之外筑有瓮城。深邃的护城河环绕着，为小城平添了几分幽远的气息。
The town's most conspicuous feature was a tall, richly decorated bell tower of dark brown stone, which had originally been built in the sixth century when Buddhism had been introduced to the area. Every night the bell was rung to signal the time, and the tower also functioned as a fire and flood alarm. Yixian was a prosperous market town.
小城中最引人注目的是钟楼。这座古朴典雅的黑褐色石头建筑始建于六世纪，是当年佛教传人该地的产物。每到夜晚，报时的钟声清晰悦耳。一旦出现火灾水患，钟楼也作报警之用。义县是个繁华鼎盛的商业小城，四周的平地地带盛产棉花、玉米、高粱、大豆、芝麻以及梨、苹果和葡萄。再往西去的草原和丘陵，放牧着绵羊与牛群。
The plains around produced cotton, maize, sorghum, soybeans, sesame, pears, apples, and grapes. In the grassland areas and in the hills to the west, farmers grazed sheep and cattle.
My great-grandfather, Yang Ru-shan, was born in 1894, when the whole of China was ruled by an emperor who resided in Peking. The imperial family were Manchus who had conquered China in 1644 from Manchuria, which was their base. The Yangs were Han, ethnic Chinese, and had ventured north of the Great Wall in search of opportunity.
我的外曾祖父杨汝山生于1894年，当时满族皇帝统治整个中国。满族发祥于东北，当他们大举入关，攻城陷地，于1644年征服全中国时，属于汉族的杨家先辈为了谋生而闯关到了东北。
My great-grandfather was the only son, which made him of supreme importance to his family. Only a son could perpetuate the family name without him, the family line would stop, which, to the Chinese, amounted to the greatest possible betrayal of one's ancestors. He was sent to a good school. The goal was for him to pass the examinations to become a mandarin, an official, which was the aspiration of most Chinese males at the time. Being an official brought power, and power brought money. Without power or money, no Chinese could feel safe from the depredations of officialdom or random violence. There had never been a proper legal system. Justice was arbitrary, and cruelty was both institutionalized and capricious. An official with power was the law. Becoming a mandarin was the only way the child of a non-noble family could escape this cycle of injustice and fear.
外曾祖父是杨家的独子，担负着杨家传宗接代、延续香火的重任，所以他在杨家的地位非同小可。他被送进当地最好的学堂受教育，期望着有朝一日通过考试踏入宦途。当官历来是中国男人热衷追求的目标。当官就有权，有权就有钱，没权没钱的人是无安全感的。中国向来就没有一个良好的法律制度，正义没有保障，残酷被制度化，官吏们掌握着对百姓生杀予夺的大权，仕途因而成了那些出生非显贵家庭的孩子脱离困苦环境的唯一出路。
Yang's father had decided that his son should not follow him into the family business of felt-making, and sacrificed himself and his family to pay for his son's education. The women took in sewing for local tailors and dressmakers, toiling late into the night.
外曾祖父的父亲决心不让儿子步其后尘，当一个毡匠。他撙节开支，督促全家人拼命劳动挣钱为供儿子读书。妇女们不分昼夜地干活儿，为裁缝铺老板缝衣、做钮扣。由于长年累月吃力地重复同一个动作，她们的手指关节都变得红肿僵直。
To save money, they turned their oil lamps down to the absolute minimum, causing lasting damage to their eyes. The joints in their fingers became swollen from the long hours.
为了省钱，她们把油灯捻到最小，暗淡的灯光严重损伤了她们的视力。
Following the custom, my great-grandfather was married young, at fourteen, to a woman six years his senior. It was considered one of the duties of a wife to help bring up her husband.
外曾祖父十四岁结婚，妻子比他大六岁。当地人说：“女大三，抱金砖”。“大妻子”的重大责任就带大“小丈夫”。
The story of his wife, my great-grandmother, was typical of millions of Chinese women of her time. She came from a family of tanners called Wu. Because her family was not an intellectual one and did not hold any official post, and because she was a girl, she was not given a name at all.
外曾祖母的命运是那个时代中国女人命运的一个缩影。她是一位吴姓皮匠的女儿，由于家庭既非书香门第，又无人在朝做官，更因为她是个女孩，所以没有正式的名字。
Being the second daughter, she was simply called "Number Two Girl' (Er-ya-tou). Her father died when she was an infant, and she was brought up by an uncle. One day, when she was six years old, the uncle was dining with a friend whose wife was pregnant. Over dinner the two men agreed that if the baby was a boy he would be married to the six-year-old niece. The two young people never met before their wedding. In fact, falling in love was considered almost shameful, a family disgrace. Not because it was taboo there was, after all, a venerable tradition of romantic love in China but because young people were not supposed to be exposed to situations where such a thing could happen, partly because it was immoral for them to meet, and partly because marriage was seen above all as a duty, an arrangement between two families. With luck, one could fall in love after getting married.
因排行第二，大家就索性管她叫“二丫头”。“二丫头”还在襁褓中时，父亲就去世了，由伯父抚养。她六岁时的一天，伯父请一位朋友来家里吃饭，在饭桌上指腹为婚，将“二丫头”许配给这位朋友妻子腹中的胎儿——只要将来出世是男孩，就这样，外曾祖父尚未出世便与外曾祖母订了婚，二人直到结婚才见面。
At fourteen, and having lived a very sheltered life, my great-grandfather was little more than a boy at the time of his marriage. On the first night, he did not want to go into the wedding chamber. He went to bed in his mother's room and had to be carried in to his bride after he fell asleep. But, although he was a spoiled child and still needed help to get dressed, he knew how to 'plant children," according to his wife. My grandmother was born within a year of the wedding, on the fifth day of the fifth moon, in early summer 19o9. She was in a better position than her mother, for she was actually given a name: Yufang. Yu, meaning 'jade," was her generation name, given to "Three-Inch Golden Lilies' all the offspring of the same generation, while Jung means 'fragrant flowers."
十四年的宠溺有加，外曾祖父直到结婚时还奶气十足。洞房花烛夜，他竟无心进洞房，闹着要睡在母亲房中，他是睡着后才被抱回新娘炕上的。但是，尽管外曾祖父连穿衣都要人帮忙，却懂得怎样“种孩子”。一年之后，姥姥出世了。那是1909年五月初五。姥姥的命似乎比她母亲好，因为她有个正式的名字：玉芳。
The world she was born into was one of total unpredictability. The Manchu empire, which had ruled China for over 260 years, was tottering. In 1894-95 Japan attacked China in Manchuria, with China suffering devastating defeats and loss of territory. In 1900 the nationalist Boxer Rebellion was put down by eight foreign armies, contingents of which had stayed on, some in Manchuria and some along the Great Wall. Then in 1904-5 Japan and Russia fought a major war on the plains of Manchuria.
姥姥出世时，统治中国二百六十年的满清帝国已摇摇欲坠。1894—1895年，日本进攻东北，大败清军，满清政治开始丧失在东北的领土。1900年，八国联军在镇压义和团事变之后，一部分军队进驻东北，一部分则沿长城一线布防。1904—1905年，日俄战争在东北平原决胜负，结果日本战胜，从此成为东北最重要的外国势力。1911年，五岁的皇帝溥仪被推翻，中华民国成立，深孚众望的孙逸仙博士当了临时大总统。
Japan's victory made it the dominant outside force in Manchuria. In 1911 the five-year-old emperor of China, Pu Yi, was overthrown and a republic was set up with the charismatic figure of Sun Yat-sen briefly at its head.
The new republican government soon collapsed and the country broke up into fiefs. Manchuria was particularly disaffected from the republic, since the Manchu dynasty had originated there. Foreign powers, especially Japan, intensified their attempts to encroach on the area. Under all these pressures, the old institutions collapsed, resulting in a vacuum of power, morality, and authority. Many people sought to get to the top by bribing local potentates with expensive gifts like gold, silver, and jewellery. My great grandfather was not rich enough to buy himself a lucrative position in a big city, and by the time he was thirty he had risen no higher than an official in the police station of his native Yixian, a provincial backwater. But he had plans.
新政府却很快就分崩离析，国家被军阀割据。政权更迭导致的权力真空和道德沦丧。许多人用金银珠宝设法贿赂权贵，以期爬上高位。我的外曾祖父没能积攒足够的钱，到了三十岁时，仍窝在家乡义县当个警察局里的职员。不过他心里却另有打算，因为他拥有一个非常有价值的财产——她的女儿。
And he had one valuable asset his daughter.
* * *
My grandmother was a beauty. She had an oval face, with rosy cheeks and lustrous skin. Her long, shiny black hair was woven into a thick plait reaching down to her waist.
我姥姥算是个美人胚子。瓜子脸，细腻而富有光泽的皮肤，浓密黑亮的头发梳成独辫垂到腰上。大部分时间，女人只能文静，姥姥也就显得文静。但矜持的外表下，她充满活力。她的削肩柳腰是当时美的标准。
She could be demure when the occasion demanded, which was most of the time, but underneath her composed exterior she was bursting with suppressed energy. She was petite, about five feet three inches, with a slender figure and sloping shoulders, which were considered the ideal.
But her greatest assets were her bound feet, called in Chinese 'three-inch golden lilies' (san-tsun-gin-lian). This meant she walked 'like a tender young willow shoot in a spring breeze," as Chinese connoisseurs of women traditionally put it. The sight of a woman teetering on bound feet was supposed to have an erotic effect on men, partly because her vulnerability induced a feeling of protectiveness in the onlooker.
然而，姥姥最宝贵的财富是那对缠过的小脚——三寸金莲。
My grandmother's feet had been bound when she was two years old. Her mother, who herself had bound feet, first wound a piece of white cloth about twenty feet long round her feet, bending all the toes except the big toe inward and under the sole. Then she placed a large stone on top to crush the arch. My grandmother screamed in agony and begged her to stop. Her mother had to stick a cloth into her mouth to gag her. My grandmother passed out repeatedly from the pain.
姥姥两岁时开始缠脚，她的母亲先将除拇指外的所有脚趾向内弯曲贴在脚底，接着用一条二十呎长、两吋宽的白布一层层紧紧裹住，然后逼着姥姥走路。姥姥疼痛钻心，哭着、叫着、不肯动。但不走就打，不走就不给饭吃。开始时，姥姥只能扶着炕沿慢慢挪动。几个月之后，渐渐有些适应了，她母亲就用一块几十斤重的扇面大磨石，压在她脚背上，以折断脚趾的骨骼。姥姥这次不再是哭喊，而是嚎叫，垂死般的，苦苦哀求母亲住手，母亲只好用一块布塞住她的嘴。
The process lasted several years. Even after the bones had been broken, the feet had to be bound day and night in thick cloth because the moment they were released they would try to recover. For years my grandmother lived in relentless, excruciating pain. When she pleaded with her mother to untie the bindings, her' mother would weep and tell her that unbound feet would ruin her entire life, and that she was doing it for her own future happiness.
缠脚持续了好几年，以防止压碎的骨头重新长回去，多少年来，姥姥就在这种难以言喻的剧痛中挣扎生活。每当她乞求母亲松开缠脚布时母亲只是流泪叹息，一遍一遍地说：“闺女，不是妈狠心，是为你好啊！如果你有一双大脚，将来可怎么办啊！”
In those days, when a woman was married, the first thing the bridegroom's family did was to examine her feet. Large feet, meaning normal feet, were considered to bring shame on the husband's household. The mother-in-law would lift the hem of the bride's long skirt, and if the feet were more than about four inches long, she would throw down the skirt in a demonstrative gesture of contempt and stalk off, leaving the bride to the critical gaze of the wedding guests, who would stare at her feet and insultingly mutter their disdain. Sometimes a mother would take pity on her daughter and remove the binding cloth; but when the child grew up and had to endure the contempt of her husband's family and the disapproval of society, she would blame her mother for having been too weak.
在那个时代，姑娘出嫁时，从花轿中出来的第一件事，就是由婆婆撩起长裙下摆，查看脚的大小。如果不够小，婆婆会勃然大怒，甩手而去，丢下孤立无援的新娘，面对来自夫家亲戚朋友鄙视和指责的目光而无地自容。脚大往往是因为母亲心软而过早拿掉孩子的缠脚布。当孩子长大受到夫家的轻蔑并为社会所不容时，她会怪罪母亲。
The practice of binding feet was originally introduced about a thousand years ago, allegedly by a concubine of the emperor. Not only was the sight of women hobbling on tiny feet considered erotic, men would also get excited playing with bound feet, which were always hidden in embroidered silk shoes. Women could not remove the binding cloths even when they were adults, as their feet would start growing again. The binding could only be loosened temporarily at night in bed, when they would put on soft-soled shoes. Men rarely saw naked bound feet, which were usually covered in rot ling flesh and stank when the bindings were removed. As a child, I can remember my grandmother being in constant pain. When we came home from shopping, the first thing she would do was soak her feet in a bowl of hot water, sighing with relief as she did so. Then she would set about cutting off pieces of dead skin. The pain came not only from the broken bones, but also from her toenails, which grew into the balls of her feet.
中国女人缠脚的习俗大约有上千年历史，始于宫中的妃子。据爱好鉴赏女人的人说，缠脚妇女的蹒跚步态是“弱柳迎风”，他们还会因为玩赏穿着绣鞋的小脚而倍感刺激。即使在女孩子成人时，缠脚布也不能拿掉。只有到了夜间上床时，才可以用软底鞋代替。男人很少见到裸露的小脚。解开裹脚布的小脚通常被坏死的皮肉覆盖，而且散发臭气。姥姥一年所受的痛苦，我有一些印象：每当我们逛街回来，她进门的第一件事就是把脚泡在热水盆里。随着一阵细微而轻松的叹息声，她脸部因痛苦而扭曲的肌肉顿时松弛下来。然后，她用小刀切去脚底的死肉，用剪刀剪去不断生长并刺入肉中的指甲。
In fact, my grandmother's feet were bound just at the moment when foot-binding was disappearing for good. By the time her sister was born in 1917, the practice had virtually been abandoned, so she escaped the torment.
姥姥缠足恰适逢缠足之风即将根绝之时，姥姥的妹妹在1917年出生，便逃过此劫。
However, when my grandmother was growing up, the prevailing attitude in a small town like Yh~a was still that bound feet were essential for a good marriage but they were only a start. Her father's plans were for her to be trained as either a perfect lady or a high-class courtesan.
但在姥姥的成长时期，像义县这样的小城中，小脚仍被多数人认为是美满婚姻的必要条件。不过在外曾祖父雄心勃勃的嫁女计划中，仅有小脚还是不够的。她把女儿送进当地一所建于1905年的女子学校。还让她学象棋、麻将和围棋，学画画、刺绣。姥姥最喜爱的图案是鸳鸯，常把它们绣在自己的绣鞋上。外曾祖父为使她的才艺更加完备，还礼聘老师教她弹古琴。
Scorning the received wisdom of the time that it was virtuous for a lower class woman to be illiterate he sent her to a girl's school that had been set up in the town in 19o5. She also learned to play Chinese chess, mahjongg, and go. She studied drawing and embroidery. Her favorite design was mandarin ducks (which symbolize love, because they always swim in pairs), and she used to embroider them onto the tiny shoes she made for herself. To crown her list of accomplishments, a tutor was hired to teach her to play the qin, a musical instrument like a zither.
My grandmother was considered the belle of the town.
姥姥终于出落成小城的一朵名花。
The locals said she stood out 'like a crane among chickens."
当地人说她在同辈女孩子中是“鹤立鸡群”。
In 1924 she was fifteen, and her father was growing worried that time might be running out on his only real asset and his only chance for a life of ease. In that year General Xue Zhi-heng, the inspector general of the Metropolitan Police of the warlord government in Peking, came to pay a visit.
1924年，姥姥十五岁，按当地风俗，已是吹吹打打送女出嫁的时候，然而她仍待字闺中。外曾祖父开始寝食难安了，担心女儿年华老去，失去他平步青云的唯一机会。就在这一年初大显身手，北洋政府警察总监薛之珩到义县视察，给了杨汝山一个千载难逢的机会。
* * *
Xue Zhi-heng was born in 1876 in the county of Lulong, about a hundred miles east of Peking, and just south of the Great Wall, where the vast North China plain runs up against the mountains. He was the eldest of four sons of a country schoolteacher.
薛之珩1876年出生于卢龙县。卢龙位于长城以南、北京东边一百哩处，是辽阔的华北大草原的入山口。他父亲是个教书先生，他在家中排行老大。
He was handsome and had a powerful presence, which struck all who met him. Several blind fortune-tellers who felt his face predicted he would rise to a powerful position.
薛之珩相貌英俊、仪表威严，见过的人都对他印象深刻。好几位算命瞎子摸过他的脸都预言其日后会飞黄腾达。
He was a gifted calligrapher, a talent held in high esteem, and in 1908 a warlord named Wang Huai-qing, who was visiting Lulong, noticed the fine calligraphy on a plaque over the gate of the main temple and asked to meet the man who had done it. General Wang took to the thirty two-year-old Xue and invited him to become his aide de -camp.
他写有一手好字，1908年，一位名叫王怀庆的将军在怀龙大寺庙进香时，注意到寺庙横匾上他写的字，当即提出要见这位书法家，接着便延揽他为幕僚。
He proved extremely efficient, and was soon promoted to quartermaster. This involved extensive traveling, and he started to acquire food shops of his own around Lulong and on the other side of the Great Wall, in Manchuria. His rapid rise was boosted when he helped General Wang to suppress an uprising in Inner Mongolia. In almost no time he had amassed a fortune, and he designed and built for himself an eighty-one-room mansion at Lulong.
薛之珩很快受到重用，被擢升为军需官，掌管军中钱财粮食供应。他一方面为军务到处奔波，一方面也开始在卢龙和东北各地营造自己的粮栈，并在短时间内发了大财。当他替王将军出兵内蒙古成功地平息了一场叛乱后，官运更为亨通。他在卢龙设计、建造了一座八十一间房屋的大公馆，取“九(久)九八十一”的吉利。
In the decade after the end of the empire, no government established authority over the bulk of the country.
清王朝灭亡后十年间，没有一届政府曾建立起足以控制大部分中国的权威，不久有实力的军阀便为争夺北京中央政府的控制权而混战。薛之珩所属军阀吴佩孚派系(直系)，在二十年代初一度控制着中央政府。1922年，薛之珩出任京师警察总监，并兼任中央政府公共工程部的首脑之一。他管辖长城内外二十多个地区，统率万余名步、骑警。
Powerful warlords were soon fighting for control of the central government in Peking. Xue's faction, headed by a warlord called Wu Pei-fu, dominated the nominal government in Peking in the early 1920s. In 1911 Xue became inspector general of the Metropolitan Police and joint head of the Public Works Department in Peking. He commanded twenty regions on both sides of the Great Wall, and more than 10,000 mounted police and infantry. The police job gave him power; the public works post gave him patronage.
Allegiances were fickle. In May 1923 General Xue's faction decided to get rid of the president, Li Yuan-hong, whom it had installed in office only a year earlier. In league with a general called Feng Yu-xiang, a Christian warlord, who entered legend by baptizing his troops en masse with a firehose, Xue mobilized his 10,000 men and surrounded the main government buildings in Peking, demanding the back pay which the bankrupt government owed his men. His real aim was to humiliate President Li and force him out of office. Li refused to resign, so Xue ordered his men to cut off the water and electricity to the presidential palace. After a few days, conditions inside the building became unbearable, and on the night of 13 June President Li abandoned his malodorous residence and fled the capital for the port city of Tianjin, seventy miles to the southeast.
军阀间的勾结反复无常。1923年5月，薛之珩所属直系军阀开始密谋推翻他们一年前扶持起来的大总统黎元洪。与他们结盟的是冯玉样——就是那位用救火水龙头给部队施行洗礼的基督将军。薛之珩调动他的一万人马包围了北京城内主要政府建筑，要求政府支付拖欠的军饷，实际目的则是要黎大总统出丑，迫使他交出权力。黎元洪拒绝退位。薛之珩下令切断总统府的水电供应。几天后，总统府内的环境变得令人无法忍受，6月13日晚，黎元洪放弃了臭气熏天的居所，逃往天津。
In China the authority of an office lay not only in its holder but in the official seals. No document was valid, even if it had the president's signature on it, unless it carried his seal. Knowing that no one could take over the presidency without them, President Li left the seals with one of his concubines, who was convalescing in a hospital in Peking run by French missionaries.
在中国，代表权力的不仅是官员本人，还要有官印。一份公文有效与否，要看是否盖有相应的印鉴，否则即使有总统签字也不行。黎元洪深知其道，把大印藏在一位姨太太处，这位姨太太则躲在北京一家法国教会医院内养病。
As President Li was nearing Tianjin his train was stopped by armed police, who told him to hand over the seals. At first he refused to say where he had hidden them, but after several hours he relented. At three in the morning General Xue went to the French hospital to collect the seals from the concubine. When he appeared by her bedside, the concubine at first refused even to look at him:? "How can I hand over the president's seals to a mere policeman?" she said haughtily. But General Xue, resplendent in his full uniform, looked so intimidating that she soon meekly placed the seals in his hands.
黎元洪的专车在快到天津时，被一队武装警察拦住，要黎元洪交出大印。起初，黎元洪拒绝说出藏印的地方，但几小时后，他让步了。薛之珩在凌晨三点全副武装来到医院收缴大印。当他走到那位姨太太的床边时，她甚至不屑于正眼瞧他，傲慢地说，“堂堂总统大印，怎么可以交给一个警察！”但当她接触到薛之珩使人不寒而栗的目光，就乖乖地把大印放到他手上。
Over the next four months, Xue used his police to make sure that the man his faction wanted to see as president, Tsao Kun, would win what was billed as one of China's first elections. The 804 members of parliament had to be bribed. Xue and General Feng stationed guards on the parliament building and let it be known that there would be a handsome consideration for anyone who voted the right way, which brought many deputies scurrying back from the provinces. By the time everything was ready for the election there were 555 members of parliament in Peking. Four days before the election, after much bargaining, they were each given 5,000 silver yuan, a rather substantial sum. On 5 October 1923, Tsao Kun was elected president of China with 480 votes. Xue was rewarded with promotion to full general. Also promoted were seventeen 'special advisers' all favorite mistresses or concubines of various warlords and generals. This episode has entered Chinese history as a notorious example of how an election can be manipulated. People still cite it to argue that democracy will not work in China.
在随后四个月内，薛之珩动用他的警察部队以确保有直系军阀所要的总统候选人曹锟能在中国最早的一次选举中当选。薛之珩与冯玉祥派军敬把守国会会堂，放出风声：凡投票得体者均可获得一笔不薄的谢仪。结果不少国会议员闻风从各省专程赶来，八百零四名国会议员中有五百五十五名云集北京。经过台面下激烈的讨价还价，终于在选举前四天敲定了大多数议员能接受的数目：每人五千大洋。1923年1O月5曰，曹锟以四百八十票当选。论功行赏，薛之珩被晋升为平威将军。此次贿选便在中国历史上成了选举被操纵的臭名昭著一例。至今仍有人引以论证民主选举在中国行不通。
In early summer the following year General Xue visited Yixian. Though it was not a large town, it was strategically important. It was about here that the writ of the Peking government began to run out. Beyond, power was in the hands of the great warlord of the northeast, Chang Tso-lin, known as the Old Marshal. Officially, General Xue was on an inspection trip, but he also had some personal interests in the area. In Yixian he owned the main grain stores and the biggest shops, including a pawnshop which doubled as the bank and issued its own money, which circulated in the town and the surrounding area.
1924年初夏，薛之珩视察义县。义县不大，但是战略地位却十分重要。北洋政府势力范围就到这一带为止，再往北是人称张大帅的奉系大军阀张作霖的地盘。薛之珩此行也兼有私人目的：义县的主要粮栈和最大的商店都是他的，包括一家当铺——兼银行，它发行自己的银票，在城里和附近地区流通。
For my great-grandfather, this was a once-in-a-lifetime chance, the closest he was ever going to get to a real V.I.P.
薛之珩的来访对于外曾祖父不啻天赐良机，他设法为自己弄到接待薛之珩的差事，告诉妻子定把女儿嫁给薛之珩。他当然不是在征求妻子的意见，只是通知她而已。这不仅是当时民俗使然，而且外曾祖父压根儿就看不起自己的妻子。外曾祖母流泪了。但什么也不敢说。外曾祖父还特别警告不得对女儿泄漏半个字。
He schemed to get himself the job of escorting General Xue, and told his wife he was going to try to marry their daughter off to him. He did not ask his wife for her agreement; he merely informed her. Quite apart from this being the custom of the day, my great-grandfather despised his wife. She wept, but said nothing. He told her she must not breathe a word to their daughter. There was no question of consulting his daughter. Marriage was a transaction, not a matter of feelings. She would be informed when the wedding was arranged.
My great-grandfather knew that his approach to General? Xue had to be indirect. An explicit offer of his daughter's hand would lower her price, and there was also the possibility that he might be turned down. General Xue had to have a chance to see what he was being offered. In those days respectable women could not be introduced to strange men, so Yang had to create an opportunity for General Xue to see his daughter. The encounter had to seem accidental.
外曾祖父知道如果直截了当提出要把女儿许给薛之珩，不仅会贬低女儿的身价，还要冒被拒的危险。他要先让薛之珩有机会亲自看看自己所提供的是何等宝物。问题是，当时良家妇女是不准介绍给陌生男人的，外曾祖父不得不挖空心思让双方“碰巧”见面。
In Yixian there was a magnificent 9o0-year-old Buddhist temple made of precious wood and standing about a hundred feet high. It was set within an elegant precinct, with rows of cypress trees, which covered an area of almost a square mile. Inside was a brightly painted wooden statue of the Buddha, thirty feet high, and the interior of the temple was covered with delicate murals depicting his life.
义县有一座九百年历史的佛寺，由砖木盖成，有一百呎高，坐落在一平方哩大小的一排排古雅的柏树林中。大佛殿内迎面是一尊三十呎高的金身彩塑佛像，墙上绘有线条细腻的壁画，描绘释迦牟尼的故事。带客人参观此地是很自然的事，寺庙也是良家妇女可以单身前往的一个去处。
It was an obvious place for Yang to take the visiting V.I.P. And temples were among the few places women of good families could go on their own.
My grandmother was told to go to the temple on a certain day. To show her reverence for the Buddha, she took perfumed baths and spent long hours meditating in front of burning incense at a little shrine. To pray in the temple she was supposed to be in a state of maximum tranquillity, and to be free of all unsettling emotions. She set off in a , rented horse-drawn carriage, accompanied by a maid. She wore a duck-egg-blue jacket, its edges embroidered in gold thread to show off its simple lines, with butterfly buttons up the right-hand side. With this she wore a pleated pink skirt, embroidered all over with tiny flowers. Her long black hair was woven into a single plait. Peeping out at the top was a silk black-green peony, the rarest kind. She wore no makeup, but was richly scented, as was considered appropriate for a visit to a temple. Once inside, she knelt before the giant statue of the Buddha. She kowtowed several times to the wooden image and then remained kneeling before it, her hands clasped in prayer. As she was praying, her father arrived with General Xue.
外曾祖父要姥姥在某天到寺院进香。出于对佛的虔诚心，姥姥行前熏香沐浴，然后面对家中的小神龛默拜数小时，以期在寺院拜佛时能使保持心境平静。她坐上租来的马车，在一位婢女陪伴下上了路。她身着鸭蛋清色罩衫，金缕线滚边，显出线条的素净，蝴蝶形盘扣镶嵌在罩衫的右面。紫红色的百褶裙上绣有缤纷的小花。浓黑的长发梳成一条辫子垂至腰际，头上插有一朵丝质墨绿色特丹花。她一点儿妆也没化，只浓浓地薰了香，据说这是恰到好处的进香打扮。
The two men watched from the dark aisle. My great grandfather had planned well. The position in which my grandmother was kneeling revealed not only her silk trousers, which were edged in gold like her jacket, but also her tiny feet in their embroidered satin shoes.
姥姥走进大殿，跪在佛像前，先叩头数次，接着双手合十低头默拜。此时，外曾祖父和薛之珩正好走进来，立身于大殿耳堂暗处，看了个仔细。外曾父计划得很好，不光时间巧，姥姥跪着时，还把那一双隐藏在裙内的三寸金莲露了出来。
When she finished praying, my grandmother kowtowed three times to the Buddha. As she stood up she slightly lost her balance, which was easy to do with bound feet.
当姥姥叩完头站起来时，小脚一时难以支撑，身体微微一晃，失去平衡，她忙伸手扶住婢女。这时外曾祖父与薛之珩走了过来，姥姥红了脸，低下头，转身就要离开。父亲拦住了她，把她介绍给薛之珩。她忙道个万福，头一直低着。
She reached out to steady herself on her maid's arm. General Xue and her father had just begun to move forward. She blushed and bent her head, then turned and started to walk away, which was the right thing to do. Her father stepped forward and introduced her to the general. She curtsied, keeping her head lowered all the time.
As was fitting for a man in his position, the general did not say much about the meeting to Yang, who was a rather lowly subordinate, but my great-grandfather could see he was fascinated. The next step was to engineer a more direct encounter. A couple of days later Yang risking bankruptcy, rented the best theater in town and put on a local opera, inviting General Xue as the guest of honor. Like most Chinese theaters, it was built around a rectangular space open to the sky, with timber structures on three sides; the fourth side formed the stage, which was completely bare:? it had no curtain and no sets. The seating area was more? like a cafe than a theater in the West. The men sat at tables in the open square, eating, drinking, and talking loudly throughout the performance. To the side, higher up, was the dress circle, where the ladies sat more demurely at smaller tables, with their maids standing behind them. My great-grandfather had arranged things so that his daughter was in a place where General Xue could see her easily.
为保持自己的尊贵身份，薛之珩不便对地位低得多的杨汝山说些什么，但外曾祖父看得出他有点着迷了。两天后，杨汝山冒着倾家荡产的危险，包下戏院，雇来小城最好的戏班子，请薛之珩看戏。这是一座传统的露天戏院，戏台既无帷幕，又无布景。整个表演过程中，男人们围坐在台下的桌子旁，边吃、边喝、边大声聊天。妇女们则坐在旁边上方的包厢中，婢女们侍立于身后。外曾祖父特意把姥姥的座位安排在恰当的地方，使薛之珩一眼就可以看到她。
This time she was much more dressed up than in the temple. She wore a heavily embroidered satin dress and jewelry in her hair. She was also displaying her natural vivacity and energy, laughing and chatting with her women friends. General Xue hardly looked at the stage.
这一次，姥姥的打扮要比进香时华丽得多。她身着鲜亮的绣花衣，头上插珠戴宝。她与朋友们兴奋地交谈着、笑着。洋溢着青春活力，薛之珩的目光很少往戏台上看。
After the show there was a traditional Chinese game called lantern-riddles. This took place in two separate halls, one for the men and one for the women. In each room were dozens of elaborate paper lanterns, stuck on which were a number of riddles in verse. The person who guessed the most answers won a prize. Among the men General Xue was the winner, naturally. Among the women, it was my grandmother.
戏剧表演完后是猜灯谜，男、女分开在两个房间，每间悬挂着几十个精致的煤箱，上面写有用诗句编成的字谜，猜中最多的是赢家，男人一边的赢家自然是薛之珩。女人这边则是我姥姥。
Yang had now given General Xue a chance to appreciate his daughter's beauty and her intelligence. The final qualification was artistic talent. Two nights later he invited the general to his house for dinner. It was a clear, warm night, with a full moon a classic setting for listening to the qin. After dinner, the men sat on the veranda and my grandmother was summoned to play in the courtyard. Sitting under a trellis, with the scent of syringa in the air, her performance enchanted General Xue. Later he was to tell her that her playing that evening in the moonlight had captured his heart. When my mother was born, he gave her the name Bao (~I'm, which means "Precious Zither."
现在，杨汝山已经使薛总监欣赏到他女儿的美丽和聪慧。最后一招就是展现女儿的才艺了。在一个天清气朗的夜晚，他请薛之珩到家吃晚饭。酒足饭饱之后，男人们坐在小花园的凉亭中赏月，姥姥被请出闺房弹琴助兴。此时，皓月当空，暖风轻拂，空气中弥漫着淡淡的丁香花味。琴声悠悠传来，薛之珩入了迷。后来，他告诉我姥姥，那天晚上的琴声征服了他。当我母亲出世时，他为她取名“宝琴”。
Before the evening was over he had proposed not to my grandmother, of course, but to her father. He did not offer marriage, only that my grandmother should become his concubine. But Yang had not expected anything else.
琴声未落，薛之珩便向外曾祖父提亲，他要娶姥姥做姨太太。薛之珩不提娶姥姥为妻是外曾祖父意料中的事，薛之珩应该早在年少时奉父母之命娶了妻子。而且，杨家哪高攀得上薛家。女儿能被薛总监纳为妾，已属万幸了。像他这种有身份地位的人娶个三妻四妾是不足为奇的。
The Xue family would have arranged a marriage for the general long before on the basis of social positions. In any case, the Yangs were too humble to provide a wife. But it was expected that a man like General Xue should take concubines. Wives were not for pleasure that was what concubines were for. Concubines might acquire considerable power, but their social status was quite different from that of a wife. A concubine was a kind of institutionalized mistress, acquired and discarded at will.
The first my grandmother knew of her impending liaison was when her mother broke the news to her a few days before the event. My grandmother bent her head and wept.
姥姥在被纳娶的前几天才从母亲口中得知此事。她黯然饮泣，默默无语，恨父亲让她沦为姨太太，但又无权说一个“不”字。违背父母之命就等于不孝，而且就算她拒绝，也不会被当一回事，只会被看作是她舍不得离开父母。唯一有效的拒绝方式是自杀。实际上，她什么也不能说，就是说“好”，也会被看作是轻佻、不守妇道，或暗示她急于离开父母。
She hated the idea of being a concubine, but her father had already made the decision, and it was unthinkable to oppose one's parents. To question a parental decision was considered un filial and to be un filial was tantamount to treason. Even if she refused to consent to her father's wishes, she would not be taken seriously; her action would be interpreted as indicating that she wanted to stay with her parents. The only way to say no and be taken seriously was to commit suicide. My grandmother bit her lip and said nothing. In fact, there was nothing she could say. Even to say yes would be considered unladylike, as it would be taken to imply that she was eager to leave her parents.
Seeing how unhappy she was, her mother started telling her that this was the best match possible. Her husband had told her about General Xue's power: "In Peking they say, "When General Xue stamps his foot, the whole city shakes." In fact, my grandmother had been rather taken with the general's handsome, martial demeanor. And she had been flattered by all the admiring words he had said about her to her father, which were now elaborated and embroidered upon. None of the men in Yixian were as impressive as the warlord general. At fifteen, she had no idea what being a concubine really meant, and thought she could win General Xue's love and lead a happy life.
外曾祖母看见姥姥如此伤心，便劝她说，嫁给薛之珩，是她最好的归宿。“你知道薛总监的权势有多大吗？”母亲眼中流露出敬畏的表情。“你父亲告诉我，在北京人人都说，薛总监只要跺跺脚，北京城就得摇三摇！”当然，姥姥也不是没有被薛之珩的堂堂威仪所吸引，义县还没有一个男人能比得上这位军阀的风采。父亲又加油添醋地转达了不少薛之珩对她赞美的话，姥姥觉得有点飘飘然了。这一年她才十五岁，不能完全想象为人妾的痛苦滋味，还心存幻想，希望赢得薛总监的爱，过着幸福的日子。
General Xue had said that she could stay in Yixian, in a house which he was going to buy especially for her. This meant she could be close to her own family, but, even more important, she would not have to live in his residence, where she would have to submit to the authority of his wife and the other concubines, who would all have precedence over her. In the house of a potentate like General Xue, the women were virtual prisoners, living in a state of permanent squabbling and bickering, largely induced by insecurity. The only security they had was their husband's favor.
薛总监许诺她可以留在义县，住进他特意为她购买的华宅里。这样她就可以不必离开双亲，远嫁他乡。更重要的是她不必住在薛公馆，整天看着大太太和其他姨太太的脸色过活，陷于永无休止的勾心斗角中。薛之珩还同意把纳妾仪式办得和明媒正娶一样隆重，使姥姥与全家脸面有光。另有一点她觉得非常重要的是，现在父亲遂心如意，因此会对母亲好一点。
General Xue's offer of a house of her own meant a lot to my grandmother, as did his promise to solemnize the liaison with a full wedding ceremony. This meant that she and her family would have gained a considerable amount of face. And there was one final consideration which was very important to her: now that her father was satisfied, she hoped he would treat her mother better.
我的外曾祖母患有癫痫病，总觉得自己配不上丈夫，对丈夫的态度几近于卑恭屈膝。而外曾祖父却视妻子如草芥，从不关心她的健康。多年来，他一直怪她没替他生个儿子。外曾祖母生了姥姥后。曾小产多次，1917年好不容易生下第二个孩子，却又是个女的。外曾祖父着迷似地想纳妾，只苦于没钱，这次嫁女使他如愿以偿。薛之珩为显出自己的身份地位，给杨家聘礼自是出手阔绰，得利最多的当然是外曾祖父。
Mrs. Yang suffered from epilepsy, which made her feel undeserving towards her husband. She was always submissive to him, and he treated her like dirt, showing no concern for her health. For years, he found fault with her for not producing a son. My great-grandmother had a string of miscarriages after my grandmother was born, untill a second child came along in 1917 but again, it was a girl.
My great-grandfather was obsessed with having enough money to be able to acquire concubines. The 'wedding' allowed him to fulfill this wish, as General Xue lavished betrothal gifts on the family, and the chief beneficiary was my great-grandfather. The gifts were magnificent, in keeping with the general's station.
On the day of the wedding, a sedan chair draped with heavy, bright-red embroidered silk and satin appeared at the Yangs' house. In front came a procession carrying banners, plaques, and silk lanterns painted with images of a golden phoenix, the grandest s3nnbol for a woman. The wedding ceremony took place in the evening, as was the tradition, with red lanterns glowing in the dusk. There was an orchestra with drums, cymbals, and piercing wind? instruments playing joyful music.
迎亲那天，举着彩旗、抬着大匾、提着大红灯笼的队伍，簇拥着花团锦簇的花轿，浩浩荡荡来到杨家门前。旗上、匾上、灯笼上描绘着凤凰吉祥的图案。仪式按传统习惯从黄昏开始，大红灯笼在暮色中闪耀着喜庆的光芒，吹鼓手们吹奏起欢快的乐曲，鞭炮声更是震天价响。
Making a lot of noise was considered essential for a good wedding, as keeping quiet would have been seen as suggesting that there was something shameful about the event. My grandmother was splendidly dressed in bright embroidery, with a red silk veil coveting her head and face. She was carried in the sedan chair to her new home by eight men. Inside the sedan chair it was stuffy and boiling hot, and she discreetly pulled the curtain back a few inches. Peeping out from under her veil, she was delighted to see people in the streets watching her procession. This was very different from what a mere concubine would get a small sedan chair draped in plain cotton of the unglamorous color of indigo, borne by two or at the most four people, and no procession or music. She was taken right around the town, visiting all four gates, as a full ritual demanded, with her expensive wedding gifts displayed on cans and in large wicker baskets carried behind her. After she had been shown off to the town, she reached her new home, a large, stylish residence. My grandmother was satisfied. The pomp and ceremony made her feel she had gained prestige and esteem. There had been nothing like this in Yixian in living memory.
姥姥凤冠霞披，一面大红丝巾盖住头，乘着八人大轿前往新居。花轿内闷热难耐，她小心翼翼地掩起头巾，微微掀开轿帘，心情马上由紧张变为高兴：观看迎亲队伍的人群拥挤在街道两边，这和她所知道的纳妾仪式大不相同——一顶简陋的两人小轿，简简单单地铺上一层靛蓝色平布，冷冷清清，没有排场，没有热闹，更没这般风光。迎亲队伍游遍整个义县，进出四座城门，最后来到新居——一座时髦舒适的住宅。薛之珩身着戎装迎在新宅前，身边站满了当地的显贵。姥姥心满意足了，因为就她记忆所爱，义县还未曾有过如此隆重的婚礼。
When she reached the house General Xue, in full military dress, was waiting, surrounded by the local dignitaries.
Red candles and dazzling gas lamps lit up the center of the house, the sitting room, where they performed a ceremonial kowtow to the tablets of Heaven and Earth. After this, they kowtowed to each other, then my grandmother went into the wedding chamber alone, in accordance with the custom, while General Xue went off to a lavish banquet with the men.
General Xue did not leave the house for three days. My grandmother was happy. She thought she loved him, and he showed her a kind of gruff affection. But he hardly spoke to her about serious matters, in keeping with the traditional saying: "Women have long hair and short intelligence." A Chinese man was supposed to remain reticent and grand, even within his family. So she kept quiet, just massaging his toes before they got up in the morning and playing the qin to him in the evening. After a week, he suddenly told her he was leaving. He did not say where he was going and she knew it was not a good idea to ask.
婚后三天，薛之珩没出房门一步，姥姥深觉快乐，自认为很爱他，薛之珩也以一种鲁莽的方式爱着她。他完全不和姥姥谈论公事，按照传统看法，女人是“头发长，见识短”。男人即使在家，也应表现得威严庄重。姥姥也尽量少说话，早上为他捶捶腿，入夜则为他抚琴。一星期后，薛之珩突然说他要走了，但只字不提要到哪里。姥姥懂得最好什么也别问。
Her duty was to wait for him until he came back. She had to wait six years.
她的责任就是等他回来。结果一等就是六个年头。
?In September 1924, fighting erupted between the two main warlord factions in North China. General Xue was promoted to deputy commander of the Peking garrison, but within weeks his old ally General Feng, the Christian warlord, changed sides. On 3 November, Tsao Kun, whom? General Xue and General Feng had helped install as president the previous year, was forced to resign. The same day the Peking garrison was dismissed, and two days later the? Peking police office was disbanded. General Xue had to leave the capital in a hurry. He retired to a house he owned in Tianjin, in the French concession, which had extraterritorial immunity. This was the very place to which President? Li had fled the year before when Xue had forced him out of the presidential palace.
1924年9月，直奉战争爆发。薛之珩被擢升为北京卫戍部队副司令。但几个星期后，局势发生戏剧性变化：薛的老盟友冯玉祥倒戈。11月3日，总统曹锟被迫宣布辞职。同一天，北京卫戍部队解散，两天后，京师警察部队也遭逢同样的命运，薛之珩匆匆逃离京师，隐退在天津法国租界他的一所住宅内。
In the meantime my grandmother was caught up in the renewed fighting. Control of the northeast was vital in the struggle between the warlord armies, and towns on the railway, especially junctions like Yixian, were particular targets. Shortly after General Xue left, the fighfng came right up to the walls of the town, with pitched battles just outside the gates. Loofng was widespread. One Italian arms company appealed to the cash-strapped warlords by advertising that it would accept loo table villages' as collateral. Rape was just as commonplace. Like many other women, my grandmother had to blacken her face with soot to make herself look filthy and ugly. Fortunately, this time? Yixian emerged virtually unscathed. The fighfng eventually moved south and life returned to normal.
同一时期，姥姥也受到再度爆发的战火威胁，因为两派军阀都争着控制义县这样的交通枢纽。薛之珩离开后不久，城外发生激烈的战斗，抢掠四起。一家意大利军火公司对那些资金短缺的军阀打广告说，没钱买军火的话，可用“有掠夺价值”的村庄作为担保物。到处有人强奸妇女，姥姥和其他妇女一样，用锅灰涂脸使自己看上去既脏又丑。所幸义县城里没有打起来，战火向南延伸，生活恢复正常。
For my grandmother, 'normal' meant finding ways to kill time in her large house. The house was built in the typical North Chinese style, around three sides of a quadrangle, the south side of the courtyard being a wall about seven feet high, with a moon gate which opened onto an outer courtyard, which in turn was guarded by a double gate with a round brass knocker.
对姥姥来说，正常生活意味要设法在她的大宅院内消磨时光。这是一座典型的北方四合院，南面是一堵高七尺的墙，一道拱门与外院相接。铸有铜环的外院双扇正门，平时总是紧锁着。
These houses were built to cope with the extremes of a brutally harsh climate, which lurched from freezing winters to scorching summers, with virtually no spring or autumn in between. In summer, the temperature could rise above 95 F, but in winter it fell to minus 2o F, with howling winds which roared down from Siberia across the plains.
这类建筑是为了适应北方恶劣的气候。这里的夏天气温高过35摄氏度，冬天则骤降至零下30摄氏度。来自北方的西伯利亚寒流和咆哮的蒙古风经常扫荡整个平原。
Dust tore into the eyes and bit into the skin for much of the year, and people often had to wear masks which covered their entire faces and heads. In the inner courtyard of the houses, all the windows in the main rooms opened to the south to let in as much sunshine as possible, while the walls on the north side took the brunt of the wind and the dust. The north side of the house contained a sitting room and my grandmother's chamber; the wings on the two sides were for the servants and for all other activities.
大风卷起漫天黄土，铺头盖脸，迫使人们出外时不得不在头上蒙纱巾来保护脸部。建筑面北是墙，用以挡住风沙。主要房间的所有窗户都朝南开，以接受更多的阳光。院落的正面是客厅和卧室，两侧的厢房是厨房、仓库和仆人的睡房。主要房间都用花砖铺地，木框窗户上糊着白纸，光滑的黑灰色瓦覆盖着房顶。
The floors of the main rooms were tiled, while the wooden windows were covered with paper. The pitched roof was made of smooth black tiles. The house was luxurious by local standards and far superior to her parents' home but my grandmother was lonely and miserable. There were several servants, including a doorkeeper, a cook, and two maids. Their task was not only to serve, but also to act as guards and spies. The doorkeeper was under instructions not to let my grandmother out alone under any circumstances. Before he left, General Xue told my grandmother a cautionary tale about one of his other concubines. He had found out that she had been having an affair with a male servant, so he had her tied to a bed and stuffed a gag into her mouth. Then raw alcohol was dripped onto the cloth, slowly choking her to death.
按当地的标准，这所住宅称得上豪华——比姥姥娘家强得多。但姥姥住在这里，却极其落寞孤单。她有仆人作伴：一个厨子，一个守门人，两个婢女。只是他们的任务不仅是伺候她，还监视她。守门人奉命不准她单身走出大门。薛之珩临行前曾以他的另一个姨太太为例，警告姥姥。那位姨太太在薛之珩外出时，与薛之珩的一名男仆偷情。薛之珩发现后，把她捆绑在床上，用浸透生酒的布塞住她的鼻和嘴，使她慢慢窒息而死。
"Of course, I could not give her the pleasure of dying speedily. For a woman to betray her husband is the vilest thing possible," he said. Where infidelity was involved, a man like General Xue would hate the woman far more than the man.
“我当然不能便宜了她，让她死得那么痛快！”薛之珩对姥姥说，“一个女人最卑劣的就是对丈夫不忠。”每当有偷情的事发生，像薛之珩这样的人仇恨女人远胜于男方。
"All I did with the lover was have him shot," he added casually. My grandmother never knew whether or not all this had really happened, but at the age of fifteen she was suitably petrified.
“我对付那个男人就是一枪把他给毙了。”薛之珩漫不经心地说。姥姥不知道他说的是不是真的，不过十五岁的她着实被这个故事给吓坏了。
From that moment she lived in constant fear. Because she could hardly ever go out, she had to create a world for herself within the four walls. But even there she was not the real mistress of her home, and she had to spend a great deal of time buttering up the servants in case they invented stories against her which was so common it was considered almost inevitable. She gave them plenty of presents, and also organized mahjongg parties, because the winners would always have to tip the servants generously.
从那以后，姥姥一直生活在恐惧中。她几乎不能外出，她也不是四合院内小天地的真正主人，她得花很多的时间来讨好仆人，以免他们在丈夫回来后，造谣生事，这种事不是不可能发生的。她不时地送礼给仆人，并邀人打麻将，因为赢家总会慷慨地给仆人吃红。
She was never short of money. General Xue sent her a regular allowance, which was delivered every month by the manager of his pawnshop, who also picked up the bills for her losses at the mahjongg parties.
姥姥从不缺钱花。薛之珩钱庄的管帐先生不仅按月送生活费来，还帮她付掉在麻将桌上输的钱。搓麻将是当时中国所有姨太太生活的一部分。抽鸦片也同样普遍，姨太太常用此来麻醉自己，鸦片使她们安分守己，更加依赖丈夫。许多姨太太为了排解孤单空虚而吸毒上瘾。薛之珩也鼓励姥姥吸，但姥姥没有理睬他。
Throwing mahjongg parties was a normal part of life for concubines all over China. So was smoking opium, which was widely available and was seen as a means of keeping people like her contented by being doped and dependent. Many concubines became addicted in their attempts to ape with their loneliness. General Xue encouraged my grandmother to take up the habit, but she ignored him.
Almost the only time she was allowed out of the house was to go to the opera. Otherwise, she had to sit at home all day, every day. She read a lot, mainly plays and novels, and tended her favorite flowers, garden balsam, hibiscus, common four-o'clock, and roses of Sharon in pots in the courtyard, where she also cultivated dwarf trees. Her other consolation in her gilded cage was a cat.
姥姥一年三百六十五天都待在家里，除了看小说和剧本，就是种花，院内的花台上布满的凤仙花、紫茉莉和鸡冠花。在这个“金丝鸟笼”里，她唯一的伴侣是一支猫。
She was allowed to visit her parents, but even this was frowned upon, and she was not permitted to stay the night with them. Although they were the only people she could talk to, she found visiting them a trial. Her father had been promoted to deputy chief of the local police because of his connection to General Xue, and had acquired land and property. Every time she opened her mouth about how miserable she was, her father would start lecturing her, telling her that a virtuous woman should suppress her emotions and not desire anything beyond her duty to her husband. It was all right to miss her husband, that was virtuous, but a woman was not supposed to complain. In fact, a good woman was not supposed to have a point of view at all, and if she did, she certainly should not be so brazen as to talk about it. He would quote the Chinese saying, "If you are married to a chicken, obey the chicken; if you are married to a dog, obey the dog."
有时她可以出去看戏，还可以回娘家，但不得过夜。尽管父母是她唯一能倾吐苦衷的对象，但她发现见他们就是受审。父亲由于和薛之珩攀了亲而被提拔为警察局副局长，有了土地、财产，还讨了一房姨太太。每当姥姥开口诉说内心的苦闷时，他就叫她不要胡思乱想，一个良家妇女应该克制自己的情感，一心以丈夫为重，想丈夫、念丈夫当然好，但不能埋怨丈夫，更不能开口诉苦。他用“嫁鸡随鸡，嫁狗随狗”的话来教训她。
* * *
Six years passed. To begin with, there were a few letters, then total silence. Unable to burn off her nervous energy and sexual frustration, unable even to pace the floor with a full stride because of her bound feet, my grandmother was reduced to mincing around the house. At first, she hoped for some message, going over and over again in her mind her brief life with the general. Even her physical and psychological submission was mulled over nostalgically.
六年过去了。刚开始时，姥姥还会收到几封信，后来便是音信全无。姥姥的青春活力无处发泄，性生活也无法满足。由于那双小脚，她甚至不能蹁开大步来舒解心中的烦闷，只能绕着庭院蹒跚地一圈圈地走。她盼信，盼得心碎。她一遍又一遍地重温与薛之珩在一起的短暂时光，甚至她的委曲求全和一味顺从似乎也变得很甜蜜。
She missed him very much, though she knew that she was only one of his many concubines, probably dotted around China, and she had never imagined that she would spend the rest of her life with him. Still she longed for him, as he represented her only chance to live a sort of life.
她知道她不过是他的众多姨太太之一，不敢奢望与他厮守终生。但她仍想念他，想得刻骨铭心，因为薛之珩是她摆脱眼前牢狱似生活的唯一机会。
But as the weeks turned into months, and the months into years, her longing became dulled. She came to realize that for him she was a mere plaything, to be picked up again only when it was convenient for him. Her restlessness now had no object on which to focus. It became forced into a straitjacket. When occasionally it stretched its limbs she felt so agitated she did not know what to do with herself. Sometimes, she would fall to the floor unconscious She was to have blackouts like these for the rest of her life.
日复一日，年复一年，她终于死心了，意识到自己不过是薛之珩的玩物，只有在兴之所致时，才会再拣起来玩玩。苦闷和绝望常常搅得她坐卧不宁，逼得她透不过气来。当这种感觉突然翻腾上来时，她会一下子摔到地上，失去知觉，此后的一生中，她经常出现这种休克状况。
Then one day, six years after he had walked casually out of the door, her 'husband' reappeared. The meeting was very unlike what she had dreamed of at the beginning of their separation. Then she had fantasized that she would give herself totally and passionately to him, but now all she could find in herself was restrained dutifulness. She was also racked with anxiety in case she might have offended one of the servants, or that they might invent stories to ingratiate themselves with the general and ruin her life.
六年后的一天，她的丈夫终于出现了。会面完全不像她最初朝思暮想的情景：她热烈地向他献上自己的身心。如今，她只是履行妻子的义务而已。同时，她又惴惴不安，担心仆人会向薛之珩乱告状，幸好什么事也没发生。
But everything went smoothly. The general, now past fifty, seemed m have mellowed, and did not look nearly as majestic as before. As she expected, he did not say a word about where he had been, why he had left so suddenly, or why he was back, and she did not ask. Quite apart from not wanting to be scolded for being inquisitive, she did not care.
此时的薛之珩已年过半百，似乎不像过去那么威严得令人生畏。他根本未提及这几年都在哪里，为何去也匆匆，来也突然。她也无心问，她不想被斥为好追根究底，“不守妇道”。
In fact, all this time the general had not been far away at all. He had been leading the quiet life of a wealthy retired dignitary, dividing his time between his house in Tianjin and his country mansion near Lulong. The world in which he had flourished was becoming a thing of the past. The warlord and their fief system had collapsed and most of China was now controlled by a force, the Kuomintang, or Nationalists, headed by Chiang Kai-shek.
事实上，这段时间薛之珩都住得不远。他时而在天津租界，时而在卢龙公馆，过着平静安闲的隐退生活。他的风光已成为过去，军阀割据势力瓦解，蒋介石领导的国民党统一了中国，把首都从北京迁到南京。1928年，日本人暗杀了东北军阀张作霖。随后张学良少帅归顺国民党，东北正式与中国其他部分合并。但国民党并没有在东北建立有效的统治。
To mark the break with the chaotic past, and to try to give the appearance of a new start and of stability, the Kuomintang moved the capital from Peking ("Northern Capital') to Nanjing ("Southern Capital'). In 19z8, the ruler of Manchuria, Chang Tso-lin, the Old Marshal, was assassinated by the Japanese, who were becoming increasingly active in the area. The Old Marshal's son, Chang Hsueh-liang (known as the Young Marshal), joined up with the Kuomintang and formally integrated Manchuria with the rest of China- though Kuomintang rule was never effectively established in Manchuria.
General Xue's visit to my grandmother did not last long.
Just like the first time, after a few days he suddenly announced he was leaving. The night before he was due to leave, he asked my grandmother to go and live with him at Lulong. Her heart missed a beat. If he ordered her to go, it would amount to a life sentence under the same roof as his wife and his other concubines. She was invaded by a wave of panic. As she massaged his feet, she quietly pleaded with him to let her stay in Yixian. She told him how kind he was to have promised her parents he would not take her away from them, and gently reminded him that her mother was not in good health: she had just had a third child, the longed-for son. She said that she would like to observe filial piety, while, of course, serving him, her husband and master, whenever he graced Yixian with his presence. The next day she packed his things and he left, alone. On his departure, as on his arrival, he showered jewels on my grandmother gold, silver, jade, pearls, and emeralds. Like many men of his kind, he believed this was the way to a woman's heart. For women like my grandmother, jewelry was their only insurance.
和一次一样，薛之珩只住了几天。离开前一天的晚上，他忽然要姥姥和他一起回卢龙住，姥姥的心猛地一沉，思想与大太太和众姨太太同在一个屋檐下生活，不啻判她无期徒刑。她一边为丈夫捶腿，一边恳求丈夫让她留在父母身边，这是当初他在结婚时慨然允诺的。她委婉地提醒丈夫，母亲的健康欠佳，又刚生了第三个孩子，一个盼望已久的男孩，她理应尽孝道。“无论什么时候老爷光临义县，我都会陪伴您、伺候您。”姥姥轻声细语对丈夫说。第二天，姥姥帮他打点好行装，薛之珩独自离开义县，临行前，就像刚来时一样，他把大把的珠宝金银首饰放在姥姥手上，他相信这是赢得女人心的办法。对于像姥姥这样的女人来说，首饰是生活的唯一保障。
A short time later, my grandmother realized she was pregnant. On the seventeenth day of the third moon, in spring 193i, she gave birth to a baby girl my mother.
不久，姥姥发现自己怀孕了。1931年春，阴历三月十七，她生下了一个女孩——我的母亲。
She wrote to General Xue to let him know, and he wrote back telling her to call the gift Bao Q~m and to bring her to Lulong as soon as they were strong enough to travel.
她马上写信告诉丈夫。薛之珩很快回了信，给我母亲取名为“宝琴”。他要她们母女在身体好一点后尽快到卢龙。
My grandmother was ecstatic at having a child. Now, she felt, her life had a purpose, and she poured all her love and energy into my mother. A happy year passed. General Xue wrote many times asking her to come to Lulong, but each time she managed to stall him. Then, one day in the middle of summer 1932, a telegram arrived saying that General Xue was seriously ill and ordering her to bring their daughter to see him at once. The tone made it clear that this time she should not refuse.
姥姥有了孩子，欣喜若狂，觉得生活有了意义。她把全部的爱和精力都倾注在我母亲身上，这一年是在幸福中度过的。薛之珩虽不断来信要她们母女去卢龙，但每次姥姥总是找一些理由拖延行期。1932年夏的一天，一纸电报传来薛之珩病危的消息，令她立刻带女儿去见他。这回她无法拒绝了。
Lulong was about 200 miles away, and for my grandmother, who had never traveled, the journey was a major undertaking. It was also extremely difficult to travel with bound feet; it was almost impossible to carry luggage, especially with a young child in one's arms. My grandmother decided to take her fourteen-year-old sister, Yulan, whom she called "Lan," with her.
卢龙离义县有二百多哩。姥姥从来没出过远门，这趟旅行无疑是件大事。她是小脚，还要带行李、抱小孩。最后她决定带着十四岁的妹妹玉兰同行。
The journey was an adventure. The area had been convulsed yet again. In September 193I Japan, which had been steadily expanding its power in the area, had launched a full-scale invasion of Manchuria, and Japanese troops had occupied Yixian on 6 January 1932. Two months later the Japanese proclaimed the founding of a new state, which they named Manchukuo ("Manchu? Country'), covering most of northeast China (an area the size of France and Germany combined). The Japanese claimed that Manchukuo was independent, but in fact it was a puppet of Tokyo. As its head they installed Pu? Yi, who as a child had been the last emperor of China.
这也是一次冒险。东北此时再度陷于战火之中，1931年9月，日本人在逐渐扩张势力之后，发动了对东北的全面侵略。1932年1月6日，日本人占领了义县。两个月之后，“满洲国”成立，所占的领土几乎囊括了整个东北三省，面积大约是法国和德国领土的总和。日本人宣称“满洲国”是独立的，但实际上它不过是东京的傀儡政府，溥仪被推到台前，起先他被称作“执政”，到了1934年，改称为皇帝。
At first he was called Chief Executive; later, in 1934, he was made emperor of Manchukuo. All this meant little to my grandmother, who had had very little contact with the outside world. The general population were fatalistic about who their rulers were, since they had no choice in the matter. For many, Pu Yi was the natural ruler, a Manchu emperor and proper Son of Heaven.
当然，所有的这些国家大事对姥姥并无多大意义，她几乎不与外面的世界接触。普通老百姓从来无法也无权选择统治者，只好抱着听天由命的态度。对许多满人来说，曾是满清皇帝的溥仪是当然的领袖，尽管国民革命已历经二十多年，中国还未有统一的政府来取代帝王统治。在东北，人们还没有“中国公民”的概念。
Twenty years after the republican revolution there was still no unified nation to replace the rule of the emperor, nor, in Manchuria, did the people have much concept of being citizens of something called "China."
One hot summer's day in 1932 my grandmother, her sister, and my mother took the train south from Yixian, passing out of Manchuria at the town of Shanhaiguan, where the Great Wall sweeps down from the mountains to the sea. As the train chugged along the coastal plain, they could see the landscape changing: instead of the bare, brown-yellow soil of the plains of Manchuria, here the earth was darker and the vegetation denser, almost lush compared with the northeast. Soon after it passed the Great Wall, the train turned inland, and about an hour later it stopped at a town called Changli where they disembarked at a green-roofed building which looked like a railway station in Siberia.
1932年的一个炎热夏日，姥姥和她的妹妹抱着我母亲从义县乘火车经山海关进入华北。火车沿着滨海平原疾驰。数小时之后，停在昌黎站，绿瓦覆顶的建筑看上去像西伯利亚的火车站。
My grandmother hired a horse-drawn cart and drove north along a bumpy, dusty road to General Xue's mansion, which lay about twenty miles away, just outside the wall of a small town called Yanheying, which had once been a major military camp frequently visited by the Manchu emperors and their court. Hence the road had acquired the grand name of 'the Imperial Way." It was lined with poplars, their light-green leaves shimmering in the sunlight. Beyond them were orchards of peach trees, which flourished in the sandy soil. But my grandmother scarcely enjoyed the scenery, as she was covered in dust and jolted badly by the rough road. Above all, she was worrying about what would greet her at the other end.
姥姥租了一辆马车，沿着崎岖不平、黄土飞扬的道路行驶了约二十哩路。薛公馆在卢龙县一个叫燕河营的小镇外。这时有清朝时期曾是个规模庞大的军营，皇帝和大臣们经常到此巡视，那条黄泥路也因而称为“御道”。路边是成排笔直的白杨，翠绿色的叶子在阳光下泛出耀眼的光芒。白杨后面是成片的桃树林。但姥姥无心欣赏两旁的景致，沿途颠簸已使她精疲力尽。此外，她还担心到时等待她的会是什么命运。
When she first saw the mansion, she was overwhelmed by its grandeur. The immense front gate was guarded by armed men, who stood stiffly at attention beside enormous statues of reclining lions. There was a row of eight stone statues for tying up horses: four were of elephants, and four of monkeys. These two animals were chosen for their lucky sounds: in Chinese the words 'elephant' and 'high office' have the same sound (xiang), as do 'monkey' and 'aristocracy' (hou).
姥姥第一眼看到薛公馆时，就被它的威严气派所震慑。把守正门的保镖笔立在横卧的石狮旁。正门两侧各有四个系马的石猴、石象。“猴”、“象”与“侯”、“相”谐音，讨个“封侯拜相”的吉利。马车通过外门，一堵高大的白墙迎面而立，绕过白墙便是内门。此墙称作“影壁”，既可挡住来客的视线，让人摸不清公馆内部的陈设，又可防止刺客来袭。
As the cart passed through the outer gate into an inner yard my grandmother could see only a huge blank wall facing her; then, off to one side, she saw a second gate.
This was a classic Chinese structure, a concealing wall so that strangers could not see into one's property, also making it impossible for assailants to shoot or charge directly through the front gate.
The moment they passed through the inner gate, a servant materialized at my grandmother's side and peremptorily took her child away. Another servant led my grandmother up the steps of the house and showed her into the sitting room of General Xue's wife.
在她们穿过内门后，一位婢女不声不响地出现在姥姥身旁，强把她手中的孩子抱过去。另一位婢女则引她进入大太太的起居室。
As soon as she entered the room, my grandmother went down on her knees and kowtowed, saying, "I greet you, my mistress," as etiquette demanded. My grandmother's sister was not allowed into the room, but had to stand outside like a servant. This was nothing personal: the relatives of a concubine were not treated as part of the family. After my grandmother had kowtowed for a suitable length of time, the general's wife told her she could get up, using a form of address which immediately established my grandmother's place in the hierarchy of the household as a mere sub mistress closer to a higher form of servant than to a wife.
一进到这里，姥姥就得按礼跪下，边叩头边说，“给太太叩头、请安。”姥姥的妹妹不准入内，只能与婢女一样待在起居室外。规矩就是这样，姨太太的家人不算亲戚。当姥姥叩完头后，大太太发话让她起来，并称她为“芳姑娘”，这个称呼马上定了姥姥在家中的地位：“姑娘”比“姨太太”地位还低，只比仆人高一点。
The general's wife told her to sit down. My grandmother had to make a split-second decision. In a traditional Chinese household, where one sits automatically reflects one's status. General Xue's wife was sitting at the north end of the room, as befitted a person in her position. Next to her, separated by a side table, was another chair, also facing south: this was the general's seat. Down each side of the room was a row of chairs for people of different status. My grandmother shuffled backwards and sat on one of the chairs nearest the door, to show humility. The wife then asked her to come forward just a little. She had to show some generosity.
大太太要姥姥坐下。在传统中国家庭中，座位反映出一个人的身份地位。大太太坐在房间的北端，与她的身份相符。和她并排隔着茶桌的一张椅子，是薛之珩的座位。东、西两侧分别排了一排椅子，分属不同等级。姥姥后退走到最靠近门口的一张椅子坐下，以表示身份低下和谦恭。大太太要她往前挪一点，以示宽厚仁慈。
When my grandmother was seated, the wife told her that from now on her daughter would be brought up as her (the wife's) own daughter and would call her, not my grandmother, "Mama'; my grandmother was to treat the child as the young mistress of the house, and was to behave accordingly.
待姥姥坐定，大太太说，从现在起，姥姥的女儿就算大太太本人的亲生女儿了，应称大太太为“妈妈”，改叫姥姥为“姨娘”姥姥要把女儿看作薛公馆的小女主人，举止也要与身份相符。
A maid was summoned to lead my grandmother away.
She felt her heart was breaking, but she forced back her sobs, only letting herself go when she reached her room. Her eyes were still red when she was taken to meet General Xue's number-two concubine, his favorite, who ran the household. She was pretty, with a delicate face, and to my grandmother's surprise she was quite sympathetic, but my grandmother restrained herself from having a good cry with her. In this strange new environment, she felt intuitively that the best policy was caution.
婢女引姥姥退出房时，姥姥埋着头，强忍住泪水，回到自己的房间才放声大哭。当她被唤去见薛之珩的二姨太时，眼圈仍是红肿的。二姨太长得十分俊俏，是薛之珩的宠妾，负责管理公馆的大小事务。出乎姥姥意外的是，二姨太很同情她。但姥姥不敢完全信任她，在这个陌生的环境中，还是处处小心为是。
Later that day she was taken to see her 'husband." She was allowed to take my mother with her. The general was lying on a kang, the type of bed used all over North China, a large, flat, rectangular surface about two and a half feet high heated from underneath by a brick stove. A pair of concubines or maids were kneeling round the prostrate general, massaging his legs and stomach. General Xue's eyes were closed, and he looked terribly sallow. My grandmother leaned over the edge of the bed, calling to him softly. He opened his eyes and managed a kind of a half smile? My grandmother put my mother on the bed and said: "This is Bao Odin." With what seemed a great effort, General Xue feebly stroked my mother's head and said, "Bao Odin takes after you; she is very pretty." Then he closed his eyes.
直到这天晚上，她才被带去见丈夫，这次准她带上女儿。薛之珩躺在一个暖炕上，两个不知是姨太太还是婢女的人跪在两边为他捶腿、按摩腹部，他双眼紧闭，脸色死灰。姥姥俯身轻轻唤他。他微微张开双眼，勉强挤出笑容，姥姥把女儿抱到他眼前说，“宝琴来了。”薛之珩费了很大的才抖索地伸出手来抚摸婴儿的头说，“宝琴像你，长得好俊！”说罢又合上了眼。
My grandmother called out to him, but his eyes remained shut. She could see that he was gravely ill, perhaps dying. She picked my mother off the bed and hugged her tight. But she had only a second to cuddle her before the general's wife, who had been hovering alongside, tugged impatiently at her sleeve. Once outside, the wife warned my grandmother not to disturb the master too often, or indeed at all. In fact, she should stay in her room unless she was summoned.
姥姥连连呼唤他，但他双眼未再睁开。可以看出，他已是病入膏肓，活不了多久了。姥姥紧紧搂住女儿。大太太就在身后，不耐烦地扯扯姥姥袖子，催促她离开。她刚踏出门，大太太就唤人抱走了我母亲，并告诫姥姥，不得经常到此打扰薛之珩，只能呆在自己房中，听候召唤。
My grandmother was terrified. As a concubine, her whole future and that of her daughter were in jeopardy, possibly even in mortal peril. She had no rights. If the general died, she would be at the mercy of the wife, who had the power of life and death over her. She could do anything she wanted sell her to a rich man, or even into a brothel, which was quite common. Then my grandmother would never see her daughter again. She knew she and her daughter had to get away as fast as possible.
姥姥心里充满了恐慌。她在薛家一点地位也没有，一旦薛之珩去世，她和女儿的命运就完全掌握在大太太手中。只要大太太愿意，可以把她送给富人作妾，或卖进妓院为娼——这类事在当时相当普遍。姥姥也将永远无法与女儿团聚。
When she got back to her room, she made a tremendous effort to calm herself and begin planning her escape. But when she tried to think, she felt as though her head were flooding with blood. Her legs were so weak she could not walk without holding on to the furniture. She broke down and wept again partly with rage, because she could see no way out. Worst of all was the thought that the general might die at any moment, leaving her trapped forever.
姥姥明白现在只有一条路——尽快逃走。她慢慢控制住自己，开始观察公馆内的环境。薛公馆由许多院落组成，四周的围墙极高。花园的设计是出于安全而非美观考虑：院内有几棵柏树、一些白桦和李树，但没有一棵靠近院墙，连大一点的灌木丛也没有，使刺客盗贼无可乘之机。花园的两道旁门都加了锁，大前门一天二十四小时有保镖守卫。
Gradually she managed to bring her nerves under control and force herself to think clearly. She started to look around the mansion systematically. It was divided into many different courtyards, set within a large compound, surrounded by high walls. Even the garden was designed with security rather than aesthetics in mind. There were a few cypress trees, some birches and winter plums, but none near the walls. To make doubly sure that any potential assassin would have no cover, there were not even any large shrubs. The two gates leading out from the garden were padlocked, and the front gate was guarded around the clock by armed retainers. My grandmother was never allowed to leave the walled precincts. She was permitted to visit the general each day, but only on a sort of organized tour with some of the other women, when she would file past his bed and murmur, "I greet you, my lord."
没有大太太的准许，姥姥不能踏出她住的小院一步。每天只准她和别的妾一道参见病得不省人事的薛之珩。当她按顺序到薛之珩的炕前请安时，口里总是要喃喃地说，“给老爷请安。”
Meanwhile, she began to get a clearer idea of the other personalities in the household. Apart from the general's wife, the woman who seemed to count most was the number-two concubine. My grandmother discovered that she had instructed the servants to treat her well, which made her situation much easier. In a household like this, the attitude of the servants was determined by the status of those they had to serve. They fawned on those in favor, and bullied those who had fallen from grace.
她逐渐对薛家有了进一步了解。她发现二姨太不仅对她很同情，还命令仆人好好伺候她，使她的日子好过多了。在这样的大家族中，仆人的态度视服侍对象的地位而定。他们对受宠者摇尾乞怜，对失势者则落井下石。二姨太也有一个女儿，比我母亲大一点。这是两位妇女同命相连的一条纽带，也是她们博得薛之珩欢心的原因之一。薛之珩只有这两个女儿。
The number-two concubine had a daughter a lime older than my mother. This was a further bond between the two women, as well as being a reason for the concubine's favor with General Xue, who had no other children apart from my mother.
After a month, during which the two concubines became quite friendly, my grandmother went to see the general's wife and told her she needed to go home to fetch some clothes. The wife gave permission, but when my grandmother asked if she could take her daughter to say goodbye to her grandparents, she refused. The Xue bloodline could not be taken out of the house.
一个多月后，她们两人成了好友，姥姥向二姨太表露了出逃的愿望。经过一番商议，姥姥去见大太太，提出要回义县取一些衣服，大太太准了。但当姥姥问她是否可以带女儿回去向外公、外婆告别时，她拒绝了。薛家的血脉不能离开这座公馆。
And so my grandmother set off alone down the dusty road to Changli. After the coachman had dropped her off at the railway station, she started asking around among the people hanging about there. She found two horsemen who were prepared to provide her with the transportation she needed. She waited for nightfall, and then raced back to Lulong with them and their two horses by a shortcut. One of the men seated her on a saddle and ran in front, holding the horse by the rein.
于是姥姥只身上路到了昌黎车站，等送她的人打道回府后，她便从聚集在车站四周觅活干的人群里挑出两位精壮的马夫。等到入夜后，姥姥坐在马上，由一位马夫牵着缀绳在前引路，三人一路疾行返回卢龙，直夺薛公馆花园旁门。姥姥发出预先讲好的信号，虽然等待的时间只有几分钟，她却感觉仿佛过了好几个钟头。终于门开了，玉兰抱着我母亲出现在月光下。门是有钥匙的二姨太打开的，她事后用利斧劈破了门，使它看上去像是毁门逃走一般。
When she reached the mansion, she made her way to a back gate and gave a prearranged signal. After a wait that felt like hours but was in fact only a few minutes, the door in the gate swung open and her sister emerged in the moonlight, holding my mother in her arms. The door had been unlocked by the friendly number-two concubine, who had then hit it with an axe to make it look as though it had been forced open.
There was hardly time for my grandmother to give my mother a quick hug besides, she did not want to wake her, in case she made a noise and alerted the guards. She and her sister mounted the two horses while my mother was fled onto the back of one of the horsemen, and they headed off into the night. The horsemen had been paid well, and ran fast. By dawn they were at Changli, and before the alarm could be given, they had caught the train north. When the train finally drew into Yixian toward nightfall, my grandmother fell to the ground and lay there for a long time, unable to move.
姥姥没敢多搂一搂女儿，就和妹妹分别骑上马，我母亲由一位马夫背着，一行人迅速消失在黑夜中。拂晓时分，赶到了昌黎车站。在薛公馆的人发现她们逃走时，她们已登上了北去的列车。回到义县，一下火车站姥姥就摔倒在地，半天无法动弹。
She was comparatively safe, 200 miles from Lulong and effectively out of reach of the Xue household. She could not take my mother to her house, for fear of the servants, so she asked an old schoolfriend if she could hide my mother. The friend lived in the house of her father-in-law, a Manchu doctor called Dr. Xia, who was well known as a kindly man who would never turn anyone away or betray a friend.
虽然离开了薛家，姥姥仍不敢带女儿回她的住宅，怕惊动仆人去告密。于是她请一位老同学帮忙，把女儿藏起来，这位朋友和公公一起住，她的公公是一位姓夏的满族医生，出了名的习慈仗义，他同情姥姥的遭遇。
The Xue household would not care enough about my grandmother, a mere concubine, to pursue her. It was my mother, the blood descendant, who mattered. My grandmother sent a telegram to Lulong saying my mother had fallen ill on the train and had died. There followed an agonizing wait, during which my grandmother's moods oscillated wildly. Sometimes she felt that the family must have believed her story. But then she would torment herself with the thought that this might not be the case, and that they were sending thugs to drag her, or her daughter, back. Finally she consoled herself with the thought that the Xue family was far too preoccupied with the impending death of the patriarch to expend energy worrying about her, and that it was probably to the women's advantage not to have her daughter around.
姥姥知道，她不过是一个无足轻重的姨太太，薛家不可能派出人来追她回去。要紧的是我母亲，薛家的血脉。于是她发了一封电报回卢龙，说女儿已在火车上染病身亡。她心烦意乱地等待回音，时而觉得薛家会相信她所编造的说词，时而又感到这种说词太容易被人识破，薛家会派人到义县捉拿她们母女。最后她安慰自己：在一家之长快要去世的当儿，薛家要忙的事太多，没法分心管她们母女。再说，薛家的人很可能会认为没有我母亲去分遗产更好。
Once she realized the Xue family was going to leave her alone, my grandmother settled back quietly into her house in Yixian with my mother. She did not even worry about the servants, since she knew that her 'husband' would not be coming. The silence from Lulong lasted over a year, until one autumn day in 1933, when a telegram arrived informing her that General Xue had died, and that she was expected at Lulong immediately for the funeral.
姥姥一旦觉得薛家已打算放过她了，便抱着女儿回到自己的家里，过着静悄悄的生活。她甚至不再害怕仆人，因为她知道丈夫不会再来了。卢龙方面一直到1933年秋才来了一封电报告知薛之珩病逝的消息，要她马上回卢龙参加葬礼。
The general had died in Tianjin in September. His body was brought back to Lulong in a lacquered coffin covered with red embroidered silk. Accompanying him were two other coffins, one similarly lacquered and draped in the same red silk as his own, the other of plain wood with no covering. The first coffin contained the body of one of his concubines, who had swallowed opium to accompany him in death. This was considered the height of conjugal loyalty. Later a plaque inscribed by the famous warlord Wu Pei-fu was put up in her honor in General Xue's mansion. The second coffin contained the remains of another concubine, who had died of typhoid two years before. Her corpse had been exhumed for reburial alongside General Xue, as was the custom. Her coffin was of bare wood because, having died of a horrible illness, she was considered ill fortune. Mercury and charcoal had been placed inside each of the coffins to prevent the corpses rotting, and the bodies had pearls in their mouths.
薛之珩是9月在天津去世的。他的遗体盛殓在生漆漆成的棺材中，覆盖上大红绣花绸缎。另有两付桉木陪葬：一付装饰铺陈与薛之珩棺木相似，装着一个姨太太的尸体。她是吞鸦片殉夫的，这在当时是极为贞节的表现。直系军阀吴佩孚为此题了一个块匾挂到薛公馆门上：贞节烈妇董氏嫂。另一付装着另一位姨太太的尸体。她是在两年前死于伤寒，此次尸体重被挖出来。与薛之珩合葬。她的棺木简陋，无漆，也无绸缎装饰，因为她是死于可怕的疾病，被认为不吉利。每付棺木内均注满水银，填充木炭防腐，尸体口含珍珠，以防朽镇邪。
General Xue and the two concubines were buried together in the same tomb; his wife and the other concubines would eventually be interred alongside them. At a funeral, the essential duty of holding a special flag for calling the spirit of the deceased had to be performed by the dead man's son. As the general had no son, his wife adopted his ten-year-old nephew so he could carry out the task. The boy also enacted another ritual kneeling by the side of the coffin and calling out "Avoid the nails!" Tradition held that if this was not done, the dead person would be hurt by the nails.
薛之珩与两位姨太太合葬在一个坟墓里，按风俗，他的妻妾死后也将归葬于此。出殡时，最重要的是打招魂幡，本应由死者的儿子执行，但薛之珩无子，大太太决定过继他十岁的侄儿完成这一重任。这个男孩的另一顶职责，是在钉死棺木盖时，跪在棺木旁高喊，“躲钉躲钉！”据说如无人喊叫的话，死者就会被钉棺材的钉子伤害。
The tomb site had been chosen by General Xue himself according to the principles of geomancy? It was in a beautiful, tranquil spot, backing onto distant mountains to the north, while the front faced a stream set among eucalyptus trees to the south. This location expressed the desire to have solid things behind on which to lean mountains and the reflection of the glorious sun, symbolizing rising prosperity, in front.
坟地早已由薛之珩本人选定，优美、肃静，背靠群山，面临溪水，风水很好，叫做“背后有靠，面前有照”。
But my grandmother never saw the site: she had ignored her summons, and was not at the funeral. The next thing that happened was that the manager of the pawnshop failed to turn up with her allowance. About a week later, her parents received a letter from General Xue's wife. My grandfather's last words had been to give my grandmother her freedom. This, for its time, was exceptionally enlightened, and she could hardly believe her good fortune.
不过姥姥并没有亲眼看到这些。她没有理会薛家的电报，没有去参加葬礼。结果薛家当铺总管不再送生活费来。过了一个星期，姥姥的父母收到薛大太太信，她转达了薛之珩的临终遗言：放姥姥离开薛家。这在当时算是非常开明的决定，我姥姥简直不敢相信她会有如此好运。
At the age of twenty-four, she was free.
就这样，在二十四岁那年，她自由了。