Free The Private Papers of Eastern Jewel by Maureen Lindley

though I was branded shameless, I refused to stand in anything but my true colours. Yet had I been more like Natsuko, diffident and submissive, Kawashima might not have been tempted to use me in the way that he did. I thought it useless to fight my nature for it would take alchemy to achieve a metamorphosis; my fate, though, was a different matter. I do not share the Chinese attitude of resignation to fate, I believe that, even unknowingly, we make our own. I made a vow never again to be the victim of my senses. I would keep that giving part of me, once offered to Yamaga, separate. It was possible I would love again, but never so deeply, or at such a cost to myself.
    Natsuko took a sly pleasure in telling me that Yamaga had become engaged the month after he had met me to the youngest daughter of a family with spectacular ancestry. This girl, she said, was so exquisite that she had been likened to the legendary Chinese beauty Xi Shi. It was said of Xi Shi that she was so delicate she could dance on a lotus leaf without sinking beneath the waters. Natsuko said the fortune-teller had forecast that Yamaga's wife-tobe would give him many sons and fill his heart with music.
    I tried not to let her see the pain her news gave me but she knew it instinctively, like an animal in a fight knows its opponent's weaknesses. I let her have her victory. Poor Natsuko, taking so much pleasure in a triumph that was not of her own making. From that time on, I understood that there are two kinds of women, those like Natsuko and Yamaga's chosen one, who give up the adventure of their lives to live safely and well thought of, and women like me who live as we choose, whatever the price. Much as I longed for Yamaga to love me, he had convinced me that I could never be the sort of woman he would be happy to take as a wife. It was useless lamenting the experiences that had made me. It was done and that was that.
    I waited until I could speak without weeping before tempting Kawashima back to my bed. I played the whore for him, the boy for him, and let him mark me with bites and bruises. But it was too soon for the pleasure of the pain he gave me to erase the deeper hurt of Yamaga's rejection.
    As Kawashima never spoke of the marriage supposedly arranged for me with the Mongolian prince, I began to hope that Yamaga had been mistaken. But soon whispers surrounding my forthcoming betrothal began in the house. I went to Kawashima and asked directly if it was true that I was betrothed to Prince Kanjurjab. He said that it was and that I should celebrate the engagement as it would be a fortunate union for me. He told me that Kanjurjab's family were highly thought of by the Japanese and it was an honour that I had been chosen by them.
    I was outraged at the idea that I would be sent like a sack of good rice to this stranger thought to be my equal, and I did all that I could to persuade Kawashima to allow me to break the marriage agreement and remain a daughter of his house. He became furious and ordered me to be silent and never to speak of disobeying him again.
    'It was my duty to find you a husband, Yoshiko; don't be so ungrateful as to question my choice.'
    He was ordering my fate in much the same way my father, Prince Su, had done when I was eight years old. Yet little had changed in the eleven years that had passed since then, I knew that there would be no reasoning with Kawashima. I was a woman and it was unthinkable that I should have ambitions of my own.
    'You will go to Kanjurjab in two months' time at the winter's end,' he said. 'The spring sun will lift your spirits and allow you to see how fortunate you are. In the meantime we can enjoy our lives as we have always done.'
    Natsuko rejoiced in Kawashima's choice of Kanjurjab for me, a union she would not have wished for any of her own daughters. Yet with me gone, whom would she have to blame for the bad luck that dogged her life?
    Sorry was old now, and didn't feel strong enough to accompany me to