Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China Read Online Free PDF

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.
     
    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.
     
    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.
     
    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.
     
    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.
     
    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.
     
    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.
     
    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