The pig, having seen Senya come out and go in again without throwing him so much as an outside cabbage leaf, squealed angrily. Senya, going into another of the little rooms at the base of the tower to smooth Melchior’s sleeping mat and his blanket, thought—He did say tomorrow! and thought how good a bit of roast pork would taste.
Melchior, climbing steadily, indeed briskly, the spiralling stairway that clung to the tower’s inner wall, deliberately put the old woman’s words out of his mind. Poor, poor, yes, he knew they were poor; but one good thing about eating scantily was that you stayed spry and lively. How many men of his age, seventy-five, could go up and down these stairs as he did, he asked himself. Very few. Leading the life,he did—he had not set foot outside the tower since he’d sold his last bit of land, and that must be at least five years ago—if he had eaten full, he would be heavy and scant of breath, an occupant of a carrying chair. As it was, only lately had he rigged the rope and the basket as a means of getting things to the top; previously he had carried diem.
Undoubtedly the worst thing about being poor was the cold. It was Spring now, the snows had melted, the frost-hardened earth was softening, but this process added a dampness to the chill of the wind which blew from far inland where it was much colder than in sea-girl Korea. He could see the damp on the stone wall, feel it in his bones. Years ago, when the tower was newly built, there had been braziers here and there on the stairs, and no fewer than three in the room at the top. When he’d moved here he had brought three slaves, Senya and two young males who had scampered up and down the stairs carrying food and water and fuel for the braziers. In those days he’d had a bed in the room at the top, and a big bell in an aperture; he had only to ring
it…. He did not grieve over the vanished service, the lost comforts, but he did feel the cold. He was glad to wrap rags like bandages over his cloth shoes and well up his legs. And all through the winter he wore his one wadded robe, a good garment in its day, now stained and faded. But Spring was on its way; the winter solstice was three months past. In a rush the warm weather, would come, and he could wear his other, unwadded robe, and Senya, as in other years, would take this one and wash it, beat the lumped wadding into fluff; and the sun, shining into the room at the top of the tower, would cherish and revive him.
Poverty, self-imposed, was tolerable. He had, he knew, only himself to blame for his state. He’d been a most fortunate young man. His grandfather had come out of China in the train of that great, that almost legendary warrior, Wiman, and in the carve-up of the conquered territory he had received enormous tracts of land which had passed eventually, undiminished, to Melchior. If, when he had come into his heritage, the tower had been built, he could have stood at the top of it and looked in every direction and known that all he could see he owned.
His father he could not remember; both his parents had died young and he had been reared by his grandfather, who, because he was a Chinese and had no learning, had a great respect for it. One day the boy Melchior had made some remark or observation—he could not remember the exact circumstance—and his grandfather had said, “I think you may be a clever boy. You shall go to the university in Pyangyong.” Pyangyong at that time prided itself upon being one of the most cultured cities in the world. Korea had, long ago, been colonised by Chinese who had brought their own culture, their own learning with them. General Wiman’s invasion had been a re-conquest, almost an invasion of barbarians; and there had been times, when in the muted, learned atmosphere of Pyangyong’s schools Melchior, because of his ancestry, had been made to feel that he was almost a barbarian. That had made him pursue his studies more diligently. He’d learned eagerly, everything, even some rudimentary Greek. Less than a hundred and fifty years before the great Wiman conquered Korea, a Greek named Alexander had marched into Asia, intending to conquer India. He’d failed-Melchior now knew exactly why—but his tongue had spread along the routes, had established itself in many places, become a means by which men of widely diverse cultures could communicate. In Pyangyong, where no born Greek had ever been, a place that no Greek had ever heard of, the young Melchior had learned Greek of a peculiar kind, together with history, mathematics and astronomy.
Astronomy had been from the moment he was introduced to it, emotionally his darling and financially his downfall. The moment he had come into his inheritance he had built this tower, at vast expense. Glass; that was the trouble. He must have glass, and only one country in the world knew the secret of its making. Egypt, a place immeasurably far away. But intrepid traders, voracious traders had held open the tenuous lines between East and West. Ask in Pyangyong—as Melchior had asked—for glass, and it was like dropping stone into a pond; the ripples spread. Months, even years, later, you had glass, fragile stuff, carefully packed, gently handled, carried on the backs of camels, donkeys, horses and mules,and men, moved by stages, paid for by stages, but arriving at last and costly beyond all reckoning. He’d grudged nothing; he had planned a great tower with a glass dome, and he was not surprised or dismayed by the fact that when at last it stood on the hill-top, just as he had visualised it, nine-tenths of his heritage was expended.
And in a way he had been right not to care; he had what he wanted; and he had a tenth of his patrimony left, and that would have sufficed to keep any ordinary careful man for as long as he lived. He simply hadn’t been careful. Could he be expected to come down, in the middle of some calculation, or the careful drawing of a chart, to deal with a dishonest steward, a defaulting tenant? The idea was absurd. He’d said—I’m busy. He’d said—I’ll deal with that tomorrow. Now and then, faced with the problem in some way that forbade escape or deferment, he’d said, “I’ll sell something.”
With what remained of his estate he could not be bothered. Nor could he be bothered with friendships or any social contacts that made demands upon his time. When the tower was new there were men who had
known his grandfather, men who hadstudied with him in Pyangyong, men with marriageable daughters. All splendid people he was sure, but to him as troublesome as flies in summer. Hundreds of times he had said, “Yes, thank you, I will come,” in answer to their invitations. Then he had forgotten all about them.
So his fortune had wasted away and his life had narrowed. Now on this very cold morning, with Spring imminent, he owned his tower, a small vegetable garden in which, presently, Senya would plant vegetables, Senya herself and a hungry pig. Nothing eke in the world.
And there was not a happier man in the world… .
Downstairs, Senya, having straightened Melchior’s sleeping apartment, moved back to the fire and looked at it with a gloomy eye. It was almost dead and she must go out in search of fuel. She looked at the miserable scrap of bread and cheese that remained and realised that she must do something about food, too.
In the past she had been in the habit of going down into the valley and hiring herself for some hours during the busy season, doing field work for which casual labour was, welcome. Bent double, she’d planted rice in wet paddy fields, and then cut and carried it. She’d planted vegetables too, and gathered them. She’d picked and packed fruit. She’d cleared fields of stones and with the same stones built fences. She’d spent hours and hours in the stinking place where hides were scraped and the hair, mixed with glue, was beaten into felt from which hats and shoes were made.
Of these activities Melchior knew nothing. She’d timed her goings out and her returns very carefully. She never left the tower until he was safely at the top, and she was always back by sunset which was the usual time for the evening meal. He had not, of course, noticed her small but invaluable contributions to the household expenses. It must be at least five years since Melchior had sold that last strip of land and had come in, trusting her absolutely, and put the money in the jar that stood in the niche. Even his bemused mind must have recognised something of the situation, for he had said, “That’s the last, Senya. Make it go as far as you can.”