Chapter 3

In my third year at Yifang House, a girl my own age arrived. Her mother had sold her.

Her name was Ah Hua.

The madam said she was supple, with the makings of a fine dancer, and told her to learn from me.

Ah Hua wasn’t like the other girls. Over the years, every girl I had seen arrive wore the same expression: tears in her eyes and despair on her face.

But Ah Hua’s eyes shone.

“Now that I’ve been sold, my family has money,” she told me. “My little brother can get married.”

“Yifang House is wonderful. No heavy work, no exhausting chores. You get pretty clothes and jewelry, and even the face powder smells lovely.”

“Miss Qiao, do you know how much a box of face powder costs outside?”

I looked at her, not knowing what to say.

So I listened.

Ah Hua had many questions, and she wanted answers to all of them.

“Miss Qiao, why are there scars on your back?”

“Miss Qiao, how can I get a room of my own like yours?”

“Miss Qiao, why do you call your servant your sister-in-law?”

I didn’t know how to refuse, so I answered each question.

Ah Hua didn’t believe me. “Why would a customer hit you?”

“If someone hurts you, surely the madams do something?”

I looked at the wasteland beyond the back courtyard. “They do.”

They treated the injured. If treatment didn’t work, a bowl of poison saved further expense. Then the body was dragged out and buried in that wasteland.

“There you are, then,” Ah Hua said with a laugh. “Madam will stand up for us. Miss Qiao, you’re just too quiet. You don’t even cry out when it hurts.”

I smiled and said nothing more.

Complaining about pain or exhaustion only made the person in charge of you angrier.

Mother had taught me that when I was small.

Whatever your employer told you to do, you did. When you worked under someone else, you had no right to complain of pain.

It was the same here.

Three months later, Ah Hua’s name was officially put up, and she began receiving customers.

Her first night fetched a high price. Delighted, the madam gave me another pearl hairpin, bigger than the first.

“Xiaoqiao, you taught her well.”

“Mm,” I answered.

I really had put my heart into teaching her everything I knew.

“Have a little wine, Xiaoqiao.” In her good mood, the madam brought over a pot and asked me to drink with her.

After three cups, she grew talkative.

“With that nature of yours, people will bully you,” she said.

I went on listening quietly.

“I—I was just like you when I was young. You couldn’t beat a word out of me.”

“You all think I have it good, but we’re all wretched women. Who’s really better off than anyone else? No one wants to be here.”

She looked toward the window opposite, where candlelight flickered.

It was Ah Hua’s room.

“Except her. A rare one, that.” There was a trace of mockery in the madam’s voice.

The man who had bought Ah Hua’s first night was Liu Manfu, the county magistrate’s son.

He had been a frequent visitor the year I arrived. Then he’d married and behaved himself for a while.

A wealthy merchant had originally won the bidding that evening. No one had expected Liu Manfu to arrive just as Ah Hua was about to be sent to the room.

He was handsome and charming. From the moment he entered Yifang House, Ah Hua hadn’t taken her eyes off him.

The madam was in a difficult position.

By rights, the merchant had come first. But the other man was the county’s little princeling. She couldn’t afford to offend him.

In the end, she left the choice to Ah Hua.

Ah Hua chose Liu Manfu without hesitation, then let him carry her to the room, her face flushed with shy delight.

After that night, Liu Manfu paid to keep Ah Hua exclusively for himself. She was not to see any other customers.

She moved into the largest room, and two people were assigned to attend her.

She became much more particular too. Her grapes had to be peeled. She ate only the sweetest bite of each melon.

After watching Ah Hua order people about all day, my sister-in-law actually said, “Why don’t you find someone to keep you too?”

“Look at Ah Hua. Such airs and graces. She’s living like a rich young lady.”

I looked at her and almost laughed.

“No family’s young lady is kept in a brothel.”

As long as we remained here, we were nothing but prostitutes.

My sister-in-law opened her mouth, then lowered her eyes and said no more.

Three months later, Ah Hua came to me. With a secretive air, she pulled me onto the bed, drew the curtains, and whispered, “Xiaoqiao, I’m pregnant.”

I was shocked.

The first rule of Yifang House was to prevent pregnancy.

A pregnant girl had no value.

“How could you risk it?” I asked.

Ah Hua smiled. “I stopped taking the medicine in secret.”

“Master Liu likes me very much. He’s said so many times that he’ll take me home and make me his concubine. I’ll be a mistress of the household.”

“I told you there could be a good life even after entering a brothel. Look at me. Everything’s about to change. Master Liu will be delighted when he knows I’m pregnant.”

But Liu Manfu was not delighted as Ah Hua had hoped.

His face cold, he told her to get rid of the child.

Ah Hua cried so hard she could barely breathe. Her cries rang through Yifang House.

Liu Manfu tossed the madam a bag of money. “You broke your own rules. Don’t blame me.”

He never came again.

Only then did I learn that his wife came from a scholarly family. The magistrate had gone to great lengths to secure a marriage above their station.

When Liu Manfu married her, he had promised never to take a concubine.

He would not defy his wife for Ah Hua.

But Ah Hua didn’t understand. She stubbornly believed he loved her.

Before the madam could bring someone to end her pregnancy, she slipped away to the county offices and made a scene, demanding to see Madam Liu.

She never saw Madam Liu. Liu Manfu kicked her, and she fainted on the spot.

When they carried her back, her face was deathly pale.

Afterward, Ah Hua was quiet for a long time. Her old swagger disappeared.

Just when we thought the entanglement was over, Madam Liu came to Yifang House.

She wore a veiled hat. We couldn’t see her face.

Her voice was soft, but every word seemed to press against us like a branding iron, making it hard to breathe.

“So you’re Ah Hua?”

“A cheap whore, and yet you could conceive?”

“You’ve made a fool of me.”

She gave a little laugh and left.

The madam quietly told me that Madam Liu had been married for three years without becoming pregnant.

Ah Hua had made such a scene at the county offices that the whole town knew she was carrying Liu Manfu’s child. Some of his relatives had used it to mock his wife, saying she wasn’t even as good as a prostitute.

Ah Hua thought little of it.

Until, a few days later, intruders broke into her room and nearly killed her.

Only then did she understand that Madam Liu wanted her dead.

She had thought she’d found true love. Instead, she’d offended someone she couldn’t afford to offend.

So she decided to run.

When I opened my eyes in the middle of the night, I saw a figure creeping out of my room.

I went after her. It was Ah Hua.

She had stolen the little chest I kept beside my pillow. It held all the money and jewelry I had saved over the years.

She wept and begged me to let her go.

I caught hold of her and wouldn’t let go.

Seeing that she couldn’t escape, Ah Hua dropped to her knees, sobbing. “Xiaoqiao, I was wrong. These thieving hands of mine should never have taken your money.”

“But I’m trying to stay alive! If I don’t leave, Madam Liu will kill me.”

“If you hold it against me, cut off my hand!”

She held it out.

Everyone thought I was spineless. I never spoke harshly, never contradicted anyone.

I only ever lowered my head and said yes.

So she was certain I wouldn’t do anything to her.

She thought I would soften, just as I’d nodded and agreed all those times she’d mocked me for being dull, wooden, and inflexible.

But that was because Mother had taught me to do whatever people asked when I had no power of my own.

Yes. Whatever they asked.

Ah Hua had asked me to cut off her hand.

In silence, I went downstairs to the kitchen and picked up a cleaver.

Ah Hua stared in shock as I walked toward her. She forgot to run.

I went up to her and seized her hand.

She struggled, but she wasn’t as strong as I was.

I raised the cleaver and brought it down. Her scream woke everyone in Yifang House.

When the madam arrived, she saw blood all over the floor and me holding the cleaver.

“Did you kill her?” Her voice shook.

I shook my head. “I only cut off her hand.”

“She stole my money. She told me to cut it off.”

Looking past the madam, I saw my sister-in-law trembling behind her.

They all remembered three years earlier, when she’d said she couldn’t bear to leave me. I had heard her, and I’d made her stay.

When the madam looked at me again, there was fear in her eyes.