Chapter 23: Gao Qing's Worries

Spring in the City of Five Rams was drawing to a close, yet the weather refused to warm. Gao Qing sat in the courtyard, staring blankly at the sky, turning over the same worn worries he had nursed for nearly two months—ever since he became a servant of the Australian masters.

When Master Gao had reassigned him, the old merchant had pulled him aside with special instructions: report everything the Australians did. In exchange, Master Gao made promises. If the foreigners departed and never returned, or if something went wrong, he would take Gao Qing's entire family back into his household. He wouldn't let them end up on the streets.

Gao Qing and his wife had discussed it many times, lying awake in the dark. What if the Australian masters wanted to take them across the sea? Could they beg to be left behind?

These Australians were generous to their servants—that much was true. Learning of his family's hardships, they had provided extra rice each month and additional wages for his son. But they were foreign sea merchants who would eventually return home. If they truly wanted to bring the family along, what then? By rights, these masters owned them; wherever the masters went, the servants must follow. That was the natural order of things. Yet Gao Qing didn't want to be uprooted again. When famine struck his home village and he'd been forced to sell himself, he had already left his native soil once. If he truly had to journey to that Australia, ten thousand li across the ocean... Surely it was a barbarous land. However ingenious their gadgets, how could it compare to China? Guangzhou wasn't his hometown, but after all these years, the city had sunk into his bones.

No matter how he turned it over in his mind, the worries multiplied. He had served in Master Gao's household long enough to know that Portuguese merchants typically waited for favorable winds in June before setting sail. The Australians probably departed around the same time—and would they want to take his family along?

He sighed again, squinting at the back courtyard gate. Steward Yan would arrive soon. By his reckoning, the Australian masters were due any day now.

Over the past two months, roughly every two weeks, the three masters would appear and stay for several days. He never knew when they came or how they entered the house. Only when daylight arrived would he find the gate to their courtyard already open, heaps of goods piled in the hall and beneath the eaves.

This always struck him as deeply mysterious—and the mystery carried a tinge of fear. Master Gao had hinted at it, even ordered him outright and promised rewards for uncovering the Australian merchants' secrets. But Gao Qing hadn't dared. Sneaking into their courtyard would be easy enough—but what if he saw something he shouldn't?

A servant's cardinal rule: never learn what you're not meant to know. Whether your master hailed from the Great Ming or from Australia made no difference.

His son, Gao Di, didn't understand what troubled his father. The boy came running over, breathless. "Dad, Mom wants to know when the masters are coming. She needs time to prepare food. Last time, Master Wang said he wanted a proper meal—he wanted to try Ming cuisine."

"Should be any day now. The timing's about right." Gao Qing counted on his fingers. "Have you got the account book ready?"

"All ready. At month-end, the masters reviewed it and praised me for keeping complete, careful records." Gao Di tilted his chin up proudly. "Master Wang even corrected my spelling. And Master Xiao said he'd teach me something called Arabic numerals later—faster than what the accountants use."

"Good, good—as long as the masters are pleased." Gao Qing's words were vague. Having the children find favor with the masters was certainly good. If these masters were Chinese, it would mean excellent prospects for his son. But—alas!—they were foreigners. Even if they didn't take the whole family, taking just one or two of the children... He couldn't bear the thought.

"I noticed Master Wen really likes Sister," Gao Di said. "Every time he comes, he calls her over to talk and gives her things. Do you think he'll take her as a concubine?"

The words struck Gao Qing's heart like a blow. His face darkened. After a long silence, he said quietly, "That depends on her fate." But inwardly, he was unwilling.

While he brooded, he heard the gate creak—Steward Yan had arrived. Gao Qing hurried to greet him, seated him at the stone table, and sent his son to fetch tea and snacks.

"Old Gao, the Australian merchants should arrive any day now." Steward Yan dispensed with pleasantries. "What about the task the master assigned you?"

"Reporting to you, sir—I really haven't been able to discover anything." Gao Qing had known this conversation was inevitable. "Those masters are very cunning. They never let anyone follow them into their quarters. And they always come and go without a trace."

"It's been two months, and you're still reciting the same few lines. Truly useless." Steward Yan had always been Master Gao's confidant; he'd never paid much attention to this menial servant who wasn't even permitted in the inner courtyard.

"Yes, yes. I'm dim-witted."

"How am I supposed to report to the master?" Steward Yan rolled his eyes. "The master is very displeased with you..."

"Please, Steward Yan, put in a good word for me..." Gao Qing was growing flustered. He fumbled at his waist and produced two qian of silver—his savings from the past two months, meant to buy fabric for the children's clothes. Steward Yan's half-true, half-false threats had frightened him. Though he no longer belonged to the Gao household, he didn't dare entrust his fate entirely to these Australian masters either.

Steward Yan took the silver, weighed it briefly in his palm, and tucked it into his sleeve. "I'll cover for you with the master for now. But this matter—you can hide on the first, but not the fifteenth. One way or another, you must get to the bottom of these people."

"Yes, yes. I understand."

"The moment the merchants arrive, bring them over immediately. At any hour."

"Yes. I understand."

Steward Yan departed. Gao Qing wiped the sweat from his forehead, his brow furrowed deeper than before. Spying for Master Gao would ultimately mean offending his current masters. Setting aside their kindness—it would be rank ingratitude. Beyond that, prying into and betraying his masters' secrets was disloyalty, a serious offense anywhere in the world. Even if he didn't die for it, he'd lose a layer of skin. But if he ignored Master Gao's orders, he'd have no chance of returning to that household later—let alone that dealing with a lowly servant like him would present no difficulty for a man of Master Gao's standing.

While lost in thought, a sworn brother from the Gao household arrived. Gao Chang came carrying a large food box—cured delicacies Master Gao was sending as a gift to the Australian masters. Gao Qing forced himself to seem cheerful and called his wife and daughter out to take it to the kitchen.

"That bastard Steward Yan came to shake you down again?" Gao Chang was about twenty-five or twenty-six, a sturdy young man. He and Gao Qing hailed from the same hometown; he too had fled famine to Guangzhou and, with Gao Qing as his guarantor, had sold himself to the Gao household. Both worked as laborers in the outer courtyard. Being from the same hometown and watching out for each other, they had sworn brotherhood.

"Alas." Gao Qing hung his head and mumbled.

"Brother, you're too timid," Gao Chang said indignantly. "You belong to the Australian masters now. Why bother with that dog? The masters are generous and let you save some money—and you go stuffing it down his hole!"

"Don't say more, brother. It's complicated." Gao Qing gazed at the sky above the courtyard wall. "This whole family... I fear we'll still need to rely on Master Gao someday." He said no more.

"Strange. Your whole family's indentures were given to the Australian masters. Why would you need to rely on Master Gao? Don't tell me the masters don't want you anymore?"

"No, nothing like that. The masters treat our family very well. They're generous and speak kindly. All good people."

"Then why would you want to go back to the Gao household? At Master Gao's, brother, you were just a laborer—a slave among slaves. Nothing like now, practically a steward. I'm envious."

"But they're foreign sea merchants after all."

"So what? They're not the red-haired, green-eyed Portuguese—all hairy and reeking. The masters speak oddly and dress strangely, but they're still Chinese."

"They'll leave someday. What if they want to take the whole family with them?"

Gao Chang suddenly understood—this was his sworn brother's true worry. He himself didn't much care. An orphan since childhood, still single, with no ties binding him—anywhere was the same as anywhere else. But his brother had a family. Putting himself in those shoes, the caution made sense.

"Brother's concerns are valid. But in my view—if you go, you go. This Great Ming may be fine, but it's not our Great Ming. A servant here, a servant in Australia—how much worse could it be? These masters are kindhearted. If your whole family follows them, you surely won't suffer." He smiled. "If I were you, I'd go along gladly—see the sights of this 'little China overseas' they call Australia."

"What you say makes sense, brother. But I don't want to die far from home." Gao Qing let out a long sigh. "Years ago, when famine struck and we needed to survive, I abandoned the old homestead and ancestral graves to flee. Thanks to Master Gao taking us in, we made it here—over ten years now. The house, the ancestors' graves—probably all gone... I've given up any thought of returning home..." As he spoke, tears fell; his voice grew thick. "I'm past forty now. Not long for this world. To be buried in foreign soil in my old age—that would mean dying with my eyes still open."

Seeing his brother's sorrow, Gao Chang offered what consolation he could. But inwardly, he disagreed. When a Gao household slave died, only those with status could use the master's gift money and their own savings to hold a Buddhist service and purchase a burial plot. Ordinary slaves received a cheap coffin and were carted to the paupers' graveyard outside the city walls, to be tossed carelessly into the earth. Did his brother want to stay behind just for that? A sudden bleakness washed over him.

This muddling youth, who had spent twenty-odd years as a servant just scraping by, felt something stir in him for the first time—a flash of uncertain clarity: Perhaps the world shouldn't be like this...

(End of Chapter)